Our reporter/ The Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC) President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) on Wednesday in Abuja, opposed the appearance of subpoenaed witnesses of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) to testify.
The respondents appeared unsettled when the petitioners called the first subpoenaed witness saying they were not prepared to cross examine the witness having been served the witness statement only on Wednesday.
The respondents, through their counsel, objected to the taking of the evidence of the witness who was said to be an Ad hoc staff of INEC during the Feb. 25 presidential election.
Counsel to the petitioners, Mr Chris Uche, SAN, informed the court that the petitioners had three subpoenaed witnesses and went ahead to call the first one.
As soon as the witness entered the witness box, counsel to INEC, Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, vehemently opposed to the witness giving his testimony.
According to Mahmoud, I was only served this morning with the statement of the witness and as such, I have to study the statement in order to do a thorough cross examination.
He insisted that the witness could not be taken since he was said to be an Adhoc staff of the Commission and as such he would have to go and look at INEC records to enable him confirm the status of the witness and prepare adequately.
Counsel for Tinubu, Akin Olujimi, SAN, that of the APC, Mr Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, also said they were served with the witness statement on Thursday and needed time to peruse it for proper cross examination.
Attempts by Uche to insist that the witness be taken saying ordinarily, subpoenaed witness statement didn’t have to be front loaded were futile as the respondents insisted that they had to peruse the statements.
Uche pleaded with the court to take at least one of the subpoenaed witnesses saying there was nothing strange in the statement to warrant an adjournment.
Following the respondents insistence, Uche urged the court to adjourn untill Thursday for the three subpoenaed witnesses to give their testimony.
Earlier, the petitioners called their 11th witness, Mr Ndubisi Nwobu, the PDP Collation Agent for Anambra.
Nwobu, in his evidence-in-chief told the court that he was forced to sign the Form EC8D because it became evident that if he did not sign, INEC would not give him a copy.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that Form EC8D is the result sheet for states.
Under cross examination by Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, the witness told the court that although the election was peaceful at his polling unit, INEC officials refused to upload the results to INEC Result Verification Portal, (IREV).
” The election went well in my polling unit and the result was entered but we insisted that the result be uploaded on IREV, all efforts proved abortive.
“There was no problem at the polling units, it was at the ward level that magic started happening, “the witness said.
He also told the court that he visited about 30 out of the 4,720 polling units in Anambra.
Also while being cross-examined by Mr Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, counsel to the APC, the witness told the court that his major grouse with the election was that there was no real-time upload of results on IREV as was promised by the INEC chairman.
The witness also told Mr Akin Olujimi, SAN, counsel to President Bola Tinubu that Labour Party won the election in Anambra.
When the petitioner attempted to call witnesses subpoenaed from INEC, all the respondents objected on the grounds that they had just been served with the witness statements and they needed to peruse them.
The Chairman of the Court, Justice Haruna Tsammani thereafter adjourned proceedings until Thursday to allow the respondents to study the witness statements of the subpoenaed witnesses for seamless cross-examination.
The respondents in the petition marked: CA/PEPC/05/2023, are; INEC, President Tinubu and the APC.
-Obi presents result sheets from more states in case against Tinubu
Meanwhile, amid objections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the Presidential Election Petitions Court sitting in Abuja, on Wednesday, admitted in evidence, results sheets from more states in the petition by the Labour Party (LP)’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi seeking to upturn President Bola Tinubu’s victory in the February presidential election.
Obi, was in court to witness proceedings.
At the resumed hearing of the petitions on Wednesday, the counsel representing the PDP expressed concerns over INEC’s objection to the admissibility of documents the petitioners sought to tender.
Obi and his party presented result sheets from more states. But the presentation of result sheets was met with stiff opposition as counsels for INEC, Tinubu and his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) raised objections to the admissibility of the results.
The lawyers informed the court that they will present the reason for their objection when adopting their final written addresses.
Having admitted the documents despite the objections, the lawyer to Labour Party remained optimistic as he announced plans to present more documents at the next adjourned date.
After admitting the documents in evidence, the court presided over by Justice Haruna Tsammani adjourned further hearing to June 8, 2023.
With NAN report
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