Our reporter/ Lawyers to LP and its presidential candidate, Peter Obi on Friday responded to the written address of the lawyers of Bola Tinubu at the presidential election petition tribunal.
Right at the opening statement, Dr. Livy Uzoukwu, Obi’s leading counsel and his team fired back at Tinubu for threatening anarchy!
“A sentence in the 2nd-3rd Respondents’ address alarmed the Petitioners and millions of Nigerians. The 2nd-3rd Respondents went too low and abandoned discretion when they claimed as follows: “Our submission is that the Petitioners are inviting anarchy by their ventilation of this issue of non-transmission of results electronically, by INEC.” This is a cheap, misguided, and destructive blackmail clearly intended to target the country’s judicialism and constitutionalism. It also aims at cannibalizing our democracy,” the written address reads.
“Let the 2nd and 3rd respondent know that where the rule of law is trampled upon or truncated, ANARCHY REIGNS SUPREME”.
On the issue of qualification, LP argued that they relied on the US district court decision which ordered that “the funds in the amount of $460,000 held by First Heritage Bank in the name of BAT, represented the proceeds of narcotics trafficking or were involved in financial transactions in violations of US laws. The above order was made by the US District court and was sequel to a “Settlement Order”.
LP further argued that one of the laws the court held was violated on was 18 USC $ 1956 which outlaws money laundering.
They further argued linking it up with Section 137(1)(d) of the 1999 Constitution that a person shall not be qualified for election to the office of the President if – (d)He is under a sentence or fine for any offence involving dishonesty or fraud.
LP mentioned that BAT/Shett in their written address stated that the judgment of the US district court must be registered in Nigeria to be referred in this case, however this was wrong as the judgment in issue is a money judgement.
LP also in replying the argument of BAT/Shett as regards whether a civil forfeiture can be equated to a fine mentioned that in Austin v. United States, the US Supreme Court held that civil forfeiture in an in-rem civil action is a fine.
As regards the disqualification of Shett, LP mentioned in their argument that Shett was not qualified to contest and hence his inability to contest disqualified BAT.
They relied on section 142 of the constitution which makes it mandatory that every Presidential candidate must nominate a “valid” VP candidate.
They argued that on the 14th of July 2022 when Shett accepted nomination for the position of Vice-President, he was still in the records of the 1st respondents (INEC) as the senatorial candidate of APC for Borno Senatorial District.
They also relied on section 35 of the Electoral Act that says that where a candidate allows himself to be nominated in more than one constituency his nomination shall be void.
In reply to the issue of Non-compliance LP argued that BAT/Shett missed the point where they said that LP did not specifically complain about issues like ballot box snatching, insecurity etc but focused only on transmission to IREV.
LP mentioned that they called witnesses such as PW4, A professor of Mathematics, who produced and tendered expert report of the data analysis and PW7, a Cloud engineer etc who all came to give expert evidence before the court and their evidence remains unchallenged.
They mentioned that the implication of section 60(5) is that the requirement of transmission or transfer to IREV is a must and was one to attract serious consequences if not done.
They further argued that contrary to the argument of BAT/Shett, the blurred copies of the results downloaded from IREV cannot by any stretch of imagination be described as the authentic version of the actual form EC8A.
They further argued that if it was the same, INEC would have issued them clean and clear copies instead of certifying blank, blurred and unreadable images.
Still on non-compliance they mentioned that they provided substantial evidence establishing their case while BAT/Shett did not rebut any.
They also made reference to the assurances given by INEC about live transmission as corroborated by the evidence in a permanent form in Exh PCK2.
As regards the FHC case which was heavily relied on by the BAT/Shett, LP mentioned that the decision of the court is inferior to, and it is deemed to have been overruled by the Supreme court in Oyetola v. INEC where the court held that the BVAs is to be used to scan the complete results in form EC8A and transmit or upload the scanned copy of the polling unit result to the collation system and on the INEC result viewing portal.
LP also mentioned that the self-serving glitch excuse is not a valid justification for the violation of the electoral act.
They also mentioned that a significant highlight of the expert data analysis produced by PW4, upon a proper and accurate computation of the result in Rivers and Benue state, showed that the petitioners (LP) won in those states.
Finally, LP argued that the return of BAT/Shett violates the mandatory provisions in the section 134 (2)(B) of the 1999 constitution.
They started by inviting the court to consider section 299 of the constitution and stated the following:
A. 25% votes in the FCT is an additional stand-alone requirement.
B. A literal reading of 134(2) of the Constitution gives the interpretation that a winning candidate must have 25% of total votes cast in two third of the states in the Federation and the FCT meaning a winning candidate must obtain 25% in 24 states and “in the FCT”.
LP in its reply also referred to Chapter 2 of the constitution which stipulates that “Nigeria shall be a Federation consisting of states AND a Federal Capital Territory ”.
They concluded by saying that BAT/Shett’s defence be discountenanced as devoid of any scintilla of merit and hold LP/Obi’s case as meritorious and grant their reliefs.
Below is the full text of the address…
Additional report from Peerlss TV
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