The presidential election petition tribunal session on
Friday was eventful as always with lawyers debating the appropriateness of
playing a video evidence tendered by the Labour Party (LP), among other issues.
Here are five takeaways.
LP PRESENTS REPORTER
AS WITNESS
At the resumption of proceedings, the LP presented a
journalist from Channels Television, identified as Lucky Ukpewo, as a
subpoenaed witness.
Ukpewo, an editor with the TV station, was asked to play
interviews with Mahmood Yakubu, chairman of the Independent National Electoral
Commission (INEC), and Festus Okoye, a national commissioner.
The LP said the video clips were stored in flash drives.
The video was said to contain interviews wherein Okoye and
Yakubu gave assurances on the functionality of the bimodal voter accreditation
system (BVAS) in the presidential election.
CONTROVERSY OVER
VIDEO CLIPS
The attempt by Jibrin Okutepa, counsel to LP, to introduce
the flash drives as evidence was met with stiff resistance.
While Kemi Pinheiro, counsel to INEC, did not object to the
admissibility of the evidence, Akin Olujimi, counsel to President Bola Tinubu
and Vice-President Kashim Shettima, raised an objection.
Olujimi objected on the ground that the flash drives were
not served on him until during proceedings, adding that he will need time to
view the content.
He said the content is unknown, noting that it would deprive
the second and third respondents of their right to a fair hearing.
The counsel also said the witness presented by the LP was
not competent to testify and asked the court to dismiss him.
In reaction, Okutepa told the court to dismiss the argument,
maintaining that the witness was competent to testify.
RESOLVING THE ROW
Following arguments between the lawyers of the petitioners
and the respondents, the five-member panel led by Haruna Tsammani admitted the
flash drives as exhibits.
Subsequently, Afolabi Fashonu, counsel to the All
Progressives Congress (APC), and Olujimi asked the court for time to review the
contents of the flash drives and prepare for cross-examination before they are
played before the court.
The court granted their request and ruled that the contents
of the flash drives would be played during the next sitting on June 10.
ATIKU PRESENTS
EX-CORPS MEMBERS AS WITNESSES
Atiku Abubakar, presidential candidate of the Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP), presented three witnesses to testify before the
tribunal.
The witnesses — identified as Grace Ajagbonna, Abidemi
Joseph and Obasa Edosa — told the court they were employed by INEC as ad-hoc
staff and served as presiding officers during the February 25 presidential
election in Kogi, Niger and Edo states respectively.
The witnesses were led in evidence by Chris Uche who sought
to adopt their written statements.
Lawyers of the respondents — INEC, President Bola Tinubu and
the All Progressives Congress (APC) — objected to the admissibility of the
documents and said they would reserve their objections until the final address.
The statements of the witnesses were however admitted as
evidence by the court.
‘ELECTION WENT WELL’
The witnesses told the court that the presidential election
was conducted smoothly in their respective polling units.
The former corps members said they were trained by INEC,
adding that they complied with all the rules and regulations regarding the
conduct of the election.
However, the witnesses said they faced difficulty in
uploading the results from their polling units.
During cross-examination, Abubakar Mahmoud, counsel to INEC,
asked Ajagbonna, the first witness, if she complied with the instructions on
the use of the bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS).
Responding, the witness answered in the affirmative.
“The accreditation process went well. The voting process
also went well. I collated the results and recorded them in Form EC8A by
myself. I signed and the party agents also signed,” Ajagbonna said.
“My Lord, to be sincere, I was not happy. I was not happy
that I was not able to transmit the result of the presidential election.
“Everything else went peacefully. The election went well.”
Joseph and Edosa gave similar testimonies to the court.
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