On Wednesday, President Bola Tinubu, the All Progressives Congress (APC), and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) opposed to the acceptance of several papers that PDP presidential candidate Alhaji Abubakar Atiku wanted to offer as proof.
At the Presidential Election lawsuit Court in Abuja’s resumed hearing of the lawsuit filed by Atiku and the PDP contesting the election of President Tinubu, the petitioners’ attorney, Mr. Chris Uche, SAN, said that the team had prepared a second schedule of papers to be presented.
Some of the evidence that the petitioners submitted was in the form of certified genuine copies of Form EC8A that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had retrieved from its Result Viewing Portal (IREV).
The Form EC8A included 20 local government areas in Ogun, eight local government areas in Ogun, 23 local government areas in Kogi, 23 local government areas in Kaduna state, and 23 local government areas in Bayelsa.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Form EC8As are sheets used to gather results at the level of voting units.
Additionally, the petitioners submitted Form EC40G for Kaduna state.
According to NAN, INEC enters the number of all polling places that were closed or where voters were unable to cast a ballot on Form EC40G.
Additionally, the certified authentic copies of Forms EC8E for certain local government areas in Kogi and eight local government areas in Kaduna state were presented.
The penultimate form utilized for the declaration of final results, according to NAN, is Form EC8E.
The Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS) print for accreditation data was also submitted by the petitioners, who also included time stamps for 33 states.
In accordance with the guidelines of Electoral Act paragraph 46(A) of the first schedule, Jegede requested that the court declare the papers to have been read.
The INEC’s legal representative, Mr. Kemi Pinhero, SAN, raised an objection to the acceptance of all papers pertaining to Kogi, with the exception of those from five LGAs: Olamaboro, Ofu, Omala, Okehi, and Ajaokuta.
He said that this was the case because the petitioners’ pleadings expressly stated the five municipal governments whose papers he did not challenge.
Apart from the states of Kogi, Rivers, and Sokoto, Pinhero also objected to the documents pertaining to the BVAS being admissible.
The attorneys for Tinubu, Mr. R. Okala, SAN, and the APC, Mr. Adeniyi Akintola, SAN, both opposed to the admissibility of the papers that the PDP and Atiku wanted to submit.
The attorneys did reserve their objections to the inclusion of the papers in evidence to be made before their closing speeches, as was agreed upon at the pre-hearing phase.
All attorneys opposed to the documents’ admissibility and also refused to agree for the materials to be taken as read.
But Justice Haruna Tsammani, the court’s chairman, let the documents into evidence and gave them the proper labels.
After upon, the case was postponed until Thursday so that the hearing could continue.
