Home Politics 2023 Presidential Election: Tribunal Strikes Out Peter Obi’s Case for Lack of Merit

2023 Presidential Election: Tribunal Strikes Out Peter Obi’s Case for Lack of Merit

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● Atiku’s Petition Being Decided

The Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT) has struck out the Labour Party’s (LP’s) petition, challenging the declaration of President BolaTinubu of All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the February 2023 presidential election for lack of merit.

In a landmark judgement, the five-man panel of judges led by Justice Haruna Tsammani held that the petitioners (Peter Obi and Labour Party) failed to establish their allegations of Corruption, overvoting and voter suppression, among others.
Below are some of the highlights of the judgement:

On the issues of  vote suppression, inflation of results, and over-voting alleged by Obi and LP the court held that some paragraphs relating to these claims have been struck out earlier due to their vague and generic nature.

Justice Tsammani, who read the lead judgement ruled that Obi failed to establish that INEC intentionally refused to quickly upload polling unit results to IReV so as to alter the results in Tinubu’s favour.

“The petitioner made the allegation of non-compliance a substantial part of their case. By the provisions of Section 135(2) of the Electoral Act, they are required to show how such noncompliance substantially affected them. If they fail to show the same, the petition fails”, the court declared.

The Tribunal noted that INEC has the power under the Electoral Act and regulations to apply manual collation of results, adding, electronic transmission is optional as there is no regulation showing BVAS must be used to electronically transmit results from polling units.

The court further stated that the only device that must be used by INEC for elections is the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS).

On the issue of substantial non-compliance with the provisions of the law, especially with regard to non-transmission of result sheets to INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV), the court held that there is no law that says INEC must transfer or transmit the results of the election from the polling units electronically.

The law simply empowers INEC to decide the means of collation of results of elections, the court argued.

ARMADANEWS earlier reported earlier that the Tribunal was set to affirm the election of President Bola Tinubu.

Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP), and the Allied Peoples Movement (APM) are challenging Tinubu’s declaration as the winner of the 2023 presidential election.

The five-man panel of judges, had rejected the testimonies and exhibits tendered by 10 out of the 13 witnesses presented by  Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP).

Peter Obi’s Witnesses Rejected 

Justice Haruna Tsammani, reading the judgement in the petition filed by LP’s Peter Obi, held that the witness statements on oath of the 10 witnesses, who were subpoenaed to testify in the case, were incompetent, given that they were not filed along with the petition as of the close of the 21 days within which the petitioners must file their case as provided by the law.

Justice Tsammani noted that the petitioners were aware of the legal provision pertaining to the filing of witness statements on oath but went ahead to present 10 witnesses without their witness statements on oath earlier filed with the petition.

The judge reasoned that the witness statements on oath, having been declared incompetent, the 10 witnesses were also not competent to testify in the case.

The court also rejected the reports of forensic analyses tendered by LP’s three witnesses insisting they were either made during the pendency of the case or by an interested party.

Similarly, the court rejected the European Union report on the polls, arguing that it was not tendered by an EU official.

Alleged Criminal Record against Tinubu

The court ruled that no record of criminal arrest, arraignment or conviction was established against Tinubu as claimed by Peter Obi and LP.

Also, the court rejected Obi and LP’s position on the alleged forfeiture of $460000 by President Tinubu.

The court also ruled that the LP and its presidential candidate, Obi, failed to prove that President Tinubu of the APC was convicted for money laundering in the United States of America.

Electronic Transmission of Results

On the electronic transmission of results, the tribunal declared that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was at liberty to decide the mode of transmission of election results during the presidential election on February 25, 2023.

Citing Sections 52 and 65 of the Electoral Act 2022, the five-man panel held that the electoral umpire (INEC) was at liberty to prescribe the manner in which election results were transmitted during the poll.

Consequently, the tribunal  dismissed the petition of the Labour Party (LP) and its presidential candidate, Peter Obi, which argued that the victory of President Tinubu be annulled on the basis of INEC’s Results Viewing Portal (IReV) to upload election results electronically in real time.

Atiku and PDP’s petition is currently being decided.

Details later…

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