Tinubu reacts as court admits INEC’s exhibit containing his bio-data

Atiku, in a joint petition filed with his party, insisted that President Tinubu had “demonstrated inconsistency as to his actual date of birth, secondary schools he attended (Government College Ibadan); his state of origin, gender, actual name; certificates evidencing universities attended (Chicago State University).

“The purported degree Certificate of the 2nd Respondent allegedly acquired at the Chicago State University did not belong to him but to a female (F) described as “F” in the Certificate bearing the name Bola Tinubu.

“The 2nd Respondent did not disclose to the 1st Respondent (INEC) his voluntary acquisition of the citizenship of Republic of Guinea with Guinean Passport No. D00001551, in addition to his Nigerian citizenship. The 2nd Respondent is hereby given notice to produce the original copies of his said two passports.’’

Following an application by the petitioners, the five-member panel led by Justice Haruna Tsammani issued a subpoena on May 26, requesting the INEC chairman to present 11 sets of exhibits. During the recent court proceedings, although Prof. Yakubu was not physically present, he sent a senior official from the commission to submit four of the requested exhibits.

Representing him, Mrs. Moronkeji Tairu, a Deputy Director from the Certification & Complaints, Legal Drafting and Clearance Department at INEC headquarters in Abuja, took the witness stand. She informed the court that she had brought Forms EC8D series, which contained the presidential election results from all 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.

The next exhibit presented to the court was Form EC8D(A), which constituted the final declaration of the presidential election results by INEC.

Additionally, the representative of Prof. Yakubu submitted reports containing extracts from the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machines pertaining to Rivers State. Furthermore, certified copies of accreditation data from BVAS, covering all 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), were also tendered.

Lastly, the witness provided a certified true copy of Form EC9, which President Tinubu had submitted to INEC. The document was accepted as evidence and marked as Exhibit PAJ 40.

Mrs. Tairu informed the court that due to the voluminous nature of certain requested documents, the commission had extracted 10 copies from each state and organized the remaining details in flash drives, which she also submitted to the panel.

On the other hand, President Tinubu, represented by his team of lawyers led by Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN, objected to the admissibility of all the documents presented as evidence.

Likewise, the legal team of the All Progressives Congress (APC), led by Prince Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, also raised objections against all the exhibits tendered by the representative of the INEC chairman.

The Respondents stated that they would outline the reasons for their objections in their final written address.

On the other hand, INEC, represented by its lead counsel, Mr. Abubakar Mahmood, SAN, expressed that it did not oppose the admissibility of the documents. However, INEC argued that the documents were irrelevant to the case at hand and contended that the petitioners had not paid the necessary fees.

In response, the petitioners’ lead counsel, Chief Chris Uche, SAN, informed the court that his clients had indeed paid N6.7 million to obtain the certification for all the requested documents from INEC, contradicting the position of INEC’s lawyer.

Earlier during the proceedings, Mr. Samuel Oduntan, a statistician, testified as the 21st witness in the case and informed the court that based on his analysis, Atiku and the PDP emerged as the winners of the presidential election.

The witness informed the court that he had examined and analyzed the electoral materials utilized during the election, particularly focusing on the Forms EC8A, which contained the polling unit results from 26 states across the country.

During the cross-examination, the statistician explained that he conducted quality checks on the data before arriving at the conclusions presented in the reports that were submitted as evidence in court.

When questioned by President Tinubu’s lawyer, Chief Olanipekun, SAN, the witness confirmed that he had previously analyzed electoral materials in numerous election-related disputes.

However, he acknowledged that his report presented to the court lacked pictorial evidence of the electoral materials he examined at INEC’s headquarters, as per the request of Atiku and the PDP.

The witness explained that his analysis process involved subtracting votes allocated to the three main political parties in polling units where irregularities occurred during the election.

He informed the court that he had reservations about the results from both Adamawa and Kano states, which were won by the PDP and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) respectively. Additionally, he stated that his report also called for the deduction of “irregularities votes” in states where the Labour Party emerged as the winner.

Answering questions from APC’s lawyer, Prince Fagbemi, SAN, the witness, said: “I have been following INEC’s activities since 1999. I am aware that the chairman of INEC had in the buildup to the 2023 general elections, stated that results of the election would be electronically transmitted and in real time.

“I, however, did not hear at any time before the election when he said that owing to the issue of security and cash crunch, the commission could no longer transmit results of the election electronically.”

Asked if he extracted information from the BVAS machines before packaging his report, the witness, said: “As at the time of preparing the report, the BVAS machines had already been reconfigured for another round of elections. So they were not available for me to extract information from them.

“I am aware that the laid down rule was that the BVAS machines were to be used for the accreditation of voters,” he added.

He told the court that from results of 26 states he analysed with his team, comprising six members, Atiku secured majority votes in 12 states.

“I was the only one that signed the report because I was the team leader,” he added.

However, the APC highlighted to the court that there was an inconsistency in the witness’s report. On one page, he claimed to have analyzed results from 28 states, while on another page, he asserted that the analysis covered all 36 states of the federation.

In light of this development, the panel led by Justice Tsammani adjourned further proceedings on the case until today.