On Friday, Peter Obi and his Labour Party (LP) closed their petition challenging the election of President Bola Tinubu before the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC).
The election that brought Tinubu to power on May 29 was being contested by Obi and LP in the petition with the filing number CA/PEPC/03/2023.
The Independent National Electoral Commission
INEC, Tinubu, Vice President Kashim Shettima, and the All Progressives Congress (APC) were listed as respondents in the petition.
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The petitioners had twenty-one days to present evidence in court to support their claims against the respondents.
Although they had promised to call fifty witnesses to the court, they only called thirteen as they were closing on Friday.
Counsel to the petitioners, Livy Uzoukwu SAN, informed the court that Yunusa Tanko, the petitioners’ 12th witness, was present to undergo cross-examination by the respondents.
Kemi Pinheiro, a senior attorney from INEC, Wole Olanipekun, a senior attorney from Tinubu and Shettima, and Lateef Fagbemi, an attorney from the APC, served as counsel for the respondents.
Tanko, a member of the LP Situation Room, served as the 12th witness (PW12), and he testified while also submitting some documents.
The witness testified before the court while being cross-examined by INEC that the results they were given were mutilated and unreadable.
When asked by Olanipekun how many party agents his party had during the election, he replied that there were over one hundred and thirty thousand (130,000) while there were one hundred and seventy-six thousand nine hundred and seventy four (176,974) polling units across the federation.
Additionally, Tanko was questioned about what the court ought to do with the twelve 12 states where the LP won and what ought to happen to Atiku Abubakar, who had been ranked second.
He claimed that he was contesting the election’s entire outcome because the IreV results were still being downloaded four months after the vote.
When Fagbemi questioned him about why he had withheld the number of illegal votes, he responded that their expert had already provided testimony regarding the number of disputed votes.
The respondents tendered through the witness judgments of the Federal High Court, with FHC/ABJ/1454/2022, delivered on Jan. 23, 2023, concerning LP vs INEC.
A judgment from the Supreme Court issued on May 26, 2023, between PDP and INEC and three other parties, SC/CV/501/2023, was also tendered.
The petitioner objected to the admissibility of the documents and reserved his reasons for his final written statement.
However, the court recognized and marked the documents as exhibits.
Peter Jari, a casual employee of INEC, PW 13 also gave his evidence.
Counsel for the petitioner, Uzoukwu, informed the court after the testimony of PW13 that they closed the case.
The defendants asked the court to allow them to go home next week to celebrate Sallah with their families and to return to the case by July 3.
A five-member panel headed by Justice Haruna Tsammani adjourned the case until July 3 for the accused to present their case.
