PEPC: Obi tenders final results of presidential poll
The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) Mr Peter Obi, yesterday, tendered Form EC8D (A) being the final results of the February 25 presidential election upon which the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Tinubu President.
The document, although not objected to by INEC, Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress (APC) as in previous instances, was admitted as exhibit by the five member panel of the PREPEC.
The final results contained the results of the presidential election from the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory ( FCT).
Since the beginning of the second week of hearing, Obi and his party had been tendering various documents to prove their allegations of rigging and other corrupt practices that allegedly robbed them of victory at the presidential election.
Before yesterday June 7, the petitioners had tendered documents ranging from Form EC8As and EC8Bs, which comprised results from polling units and wards level, from states wherein they were in dispute with the outcome of the poll.
At yesterday’s proceedings, lawyer to the petitioners, Prof Paul Ananaba, SAN, tendered the Forms EC8B series, being Wards’ results of the February 25 presidential election from the four States namely: Ebonyi, Kaduna, Oyo and Nasarawa.
A breakdown of the Form EC8Bs tendered by the petitioners are from Wards in, 12 Local Government Areas (LGAs) of Ebonyi, in Four LGAs of Kaduna, Four from Oyo and one Form EC8B from Keana LGA of Nasarawa.
The petitioners also tendered Forms EC8Cs- results of the presidential election from some Local Government Areas of 13 states across the country to prove their allegations contained in their joint petition challenging the election of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
A breakdown of the Form EC8C series tendered by the petitioners on Wednesday are those from eight LGAs of Bayelsa, 23 LGAs of Benue, 18 LGAs of Cross River, 10 LGAs of Ebonyi, 18 LGAs of Edo, 20 LGAs of Lagos, 25 LGAs of Niger state and 18 LGAs of Ondo.
Others are, 33 LGAs of Oyo, 23 LGAs of Rivers, 23 LGAs of Sokoto, 16 LGAs of Ekiti and from 25 LGAs of Delta.
The petitioners also tendered the presidential election results contained in Forms EC8Ds duly certified by INEC from 36 states of the Federation and the FCT
The respondents in the petition, INEC, President Tinubu, Vice President Kashim Shettima and the APC, through their various counsel objected to the admissibility of all the documents tendered by the petitioners and said, they will give their reasons in their final written address.
But, the five-member panel of Justices of the court, headed by Justice Haruna Tsammani however admitted all the documents as exhibits.
Obi and the Labour Party, in their petition marked CA/PEPC/03/2023 are challenging Tinubu’s declaration as the winner of the presidential election on the ground that the election was conducted in gross violation of the Constitution, the Electoral Act and INEC’s guidelines for the conduct of the election.
They also said Tinubu did not score 25 percent vote cast in the Federal Capital Territory as stated in the Electoral Act and as such cannot be returned as the winner of the election.
Further hearing of the petition continues on Thursday, June 8, 2023.
Addressing newsmen after the proceedings, Obi’s counsel, Professor Paul Ananaba, SAN, explained that the coast is now clear for his clients to begin to call witnesses to testify in their petition.
The professor of law revealed that the witnesses will speak through the admitted documents one after the other to show to the Court where electoral malpractices were carried out during the February 25 presidential election.
“I can assure you and indeed the whole Nigerians, that our witnesses in the evidence they would profer, would give life to the petition and the whole thing, would be interesting,” he said.
