Prince Tony Momoh, CPC National Chairman
The Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) Tuesday told the Court of Appeal in Abuja, sitting as the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal, that Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) printed excess ballot papers, which it alleged, the party used to rig the April 16 election in favour of its presidential candidate, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan.
The CPC also told the tribunal that the ballot papers were printed by a local firm, Tulip Press Limited.
This is contained in the testimony of CPC’s Secretary, Buba Galadima, before the tribunal.
According to him, the excess ballot papers were used to inflate the scores of Jonathan in the presidential election in the South-south and South-east zones of the country.
He said that contrary to the claim by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) that the ballot papers were printed abroad for security reasons the papers were indeed printed in Nigeria by the local printer.
“That I know as a fact that fake papers meant for the presidential elections scheduled for April 16th, 2011 in Kebbi, Sokoto, Zamfara and other parts of the North-west geo-graphical zone were printed by Tulip Press Limited,” he added.
Galadima averred that the votes recorded in favour of Jonathan and his deputy, Namadi Sambo, and the PDP were as a result of multiple thumb printing by few individuals who secured unlawful access to the many ballot papers.
He said that the multiple thumb-printing gave an undue advantage to Jonathan.
In spite of the low turnout of voters in many states of the federation, INEC still went ahead to score Jonathan with over 95 per cent of the total votes cast in many states of the federation, he said.
“INEC had claimed in many forums prior to the election that the contract for the supply of sensitive electoral materials such as ballot papers was awarded to a foreign company for security reasons.
“Jega also made this declaration when he addressed a meeting of the leadership of political parties in the country in preparation for the election in the country on steps he had taken to ensure free, fair and credible elections in the country.
“It was later discovered that the statement of Jega that the contract for the supply of sensitive electoral materials such as ballot papers was false, misleading and calculated to deceive Nigerians including the petitioner.
“I know for a fact that the contract was awarded to local companies owned by stalwarts/agents and members of the PDP that eventually took unilateral responsibility of distributing election materials with the exclusive collision of INEC and Jega while the petitioner was excluded,” he said.
Galadima alleged that Tulip Press Limited, which he claimed belonged to leading members of the PDP, was one of the local printers that printed the ballot papers.
He said further that on or about April 10, two men - Messrs Akinolu Akinto and Habila Stephen - were caught with a van loaded with about 100,000 ballot papers for the presidential election scheduled for April 16 by the police in Abuja.
“That on investigation by the police, it was found that the ballot papers were printed by a printing press, Tulip Press Limited, belonging to one Bello Gwandu, a former managing director of the Nigeria Ports Authority (NPA) and a staunch member of the PDP,” he stated.
He also claimed that the postponement of the April 9 election on the ground that foreign contractors were unable to meet the deadline for the delivery of the ballot papers, was false.
According to him, the postponement of the election was deliberate and intentional when voting had commenced in most parts of the strongholds of the petitioner thereby giving the 3rd, 4th and 5th respondents (Jonathan, Sambo and PDP) an opportunity to study the voting pattern of the electorate with a view to taking neutralising measures.
“But INEC and Jega attributed the postponement to inability of the contractors to airlift election materials on time due to the civil war in Libya and the Tsunami disaster in Japan even when Jega had in less than 24 hours to the election addressed the nation and assured it of adequate preparations for the election and that the sensitive materials were already in the vault of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN),” he added.
Galadima noted that after a thorough search of the printing press, an additional one million copies of the ballot papers meant for the presidential election scheduled for April 16 was found.
He said about 12 people were arrested by the police and were kept in custody at Utako Police Station, Abuja.
He further said that the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) for Utako Police Station, Usman Umar, told the press that the case was transferred to the Force Headquarters and that until yesterday, the 12 people arrested had not been arraigned before a court of competent jurisdiction.
The CPC secretary further alleged that just before the presidential election of April 16, a lorry load of ballot papers was removed from the stores of INEC to the Presidential Villa, Aso Rock, Abuja ostensibly for the viewing of Jonathan and when INEC was confronted with this fact, it said that the matter was under investigation.
Hearing on the petition continues today.
Source: Thisday
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