•Discloses plans to summon top INEC officials

 

From Godwin Tsa, Abuja

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, yesterday, accused the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of denying them access to vital electoral documents needed to effectively prosecute their petition challenging the February 25 election victory by President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The petitioners told the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) that after paying  N6 million to INEC for certified true copies of vital documents, the commission deliberately refused to provide them.

Counsel in the legal team to the petitioners, Eyitayo Jegede, who conducted the proceedings made the allegation after unsuccessful efforts to tender result sheets contained in INEC Forms EC8As from 10 out of 21 local government areas of Kogi State to establish the petition against the outcome of the disputed election.

The exhibited result sheets which the petitioners had sought to tender in evidence are those from Ankpa, Dekina,  Idah, Ofu, Olamaboro, Yagba East, Yagba West, Kabba-Bunu, Igalamela- Odolu LGAs.

Although, the petitioners had filed their schedule of documents along with the exhibits, the tribunal, however, said tendering such sensitive exhibits as piece meals would not be tidy enough, especially in the areas of marking and numbering them.

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Responding to the observation by the court, Jegede blamed INEC for deliberately refusing to supply his clients with the vital documents.

This is as he disclosed that the petitioners had paid N6 million for the supply of certified true copies of the items. He lamented that INEC had not been forthcoming and cooperating as required and envisaged.

He said going forward, his clients intend to subpoena some top officials of INEC to supply the required documents as last resort.

Consequently, Jegede sought for a 24-hour adjournment to enable him approach the commission to do the needful.

His request for adjournment was not opposed by counsel to the respondents.

Consequently Justice Haruna Tsammani adjourned the matter till today.

PDP and Atiku, who came second in the February 25 presidential election, are challenging the outcome of the election over alleged irregularities, manipulation of the results among others.

So far the PDP has tendered as evidence, the 2023 Presidential Election Results, INEC Forms EC8A (which is the summary of presidential election results) and Form EC8E series for the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, INEC certified documents in respect of number of PVCs collected for 2023 presidential election and the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machine-printed report for the 36 states, including FCT.Other documents tendered are additional Forms EC8A as downloaded by INEC (for 17 local government of Abia state and INEC authentication certificate), Forms EC8As for Bayelsa, Kaduna, Ogun states, certified true copies of Forms EC8Es from Kaduna and Kogi state.