How PEPC ab initio ‘locked down’ judgment by discarding petitioners’ witnesses
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Justices on the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) ruled on Wednesday both Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi failed to prove their allegations of electoral malpractices and criminal conduct against Bola Tinubu to warrant his sack as President, even though the court itself became the main stumbling block.
By their own pronouncements, the Justices had, from the get to, ‘locked down’ their verdict by rejecting at hearing key witnesses and documents the petitioners presented, using legal ‘technicalities’ to clear a path that would favour Tinubu in the endgame.
Besides, during the delivery of the judgment, the Justices announced they expunged from the court records some of the papers and submissions the petitioners presented at hearing – which could be used to prove their allegations later at the Supreme Court.
The PEPC did not seek and deliver truth and justice, as shown in the live national broadcast of the delivery of the judgment that lasted more than 13 hours – an exercise critics dismissed as an elaborate charade.
Some of the key witnesses and documents the petitioners presented to prove their allegations were declared incompetent and rejected by the court through technicalities without care for truth and the danger of doling out distortions.
In their language and tone, the Justices came off as defence attorneys for the respondents – Tinubu, the All Progressives Congress (APC), and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) – and were hostile to the petitioners.
The INEC failed during hearing to explain the “technical glitch” it claimed hobbled its transmission of the presidential election result from polling units to its IReV, whereas it transmitted those of the Senate and the House of Representatives conducted simultaneously with that of the presidential.
Yet the Justices vigorously defended the INEC over its failure to adhere to its own guidelines that it promised to follow in the election.
Rejection of Obi’s witnesses and documents
- The PEPC rejected as incompetent 10 out of the 13 witnesses Obi presented. The Justices in their pronouncements made repeated references to PW7, a lady, whose submission they ruled incompetent.
During hearing, PW7 provided to the court documents she downloaded from the server of Amazon Web Services (AWS) – hired by the INEC to provide web services – that showed there was no technical glitch on 25 February 2023, the day of the election.
- Besides, the INEC confirmed during hearing it did not report a technical glitch to AWS on Election Day.
PW7 testified she had previously worked with AWS and was now a member of the LP.
- The PEPC explained on Wednesday it ruled her an incompetent witness partly because she had a vested interest in the case being a member of the LP.
- The Justices did not cite her testimony in support of Obi’s petition but turned round and cited it several times to support the argument of the lawyers of the respondents.
- What is more, they accepted and cited in Tinubu’s favour the testimony of the only witness he presented, Senate Majority Leader Opeyemi Bamidele, a member of the APC like Tinubu.
- The Justices also changed the meaning of Section 134(2) of the Constitution that a presidential candidate must score “not less than 25 per cent of total votes cast in at least two-third of all the States in the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory” (FCT), Abuja.
They ruled there is nothing special about the FCT and it is like every other state.
The Constitution could be amended later to clarify the phrase “and the FCT” in the Section, but it is not lawful or proper to change and confuse the rule in the middle of election petition.
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PEPC verdict: Nigeria’s journey to perdition has fully begun
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Rejection of Atiku’s witnesses and documents
- The PEPC rejected Atiku’s presentation of Tinubu’s Guinean passport without dealing with the substance of the allegation of his voluntary acquisition of a dual nationality which constitutionally disqualifies him from the office of President.
- The Justices could not deny the evidence Tinubu forfeited $460,000 over drug dealing in the United States. But they ruled it was a civil case, not criminal.
- They rejected the report of the European Union Election Observer Mission (EU-EOM) which showed the INEC declared Tinubu winner with only 33 per cent of the result released. The report, which made vital recommendations to improve the electoral system, corroborated other reports by local observers.
Tinubu himself had earlier rejected the EU-EOM report.
Nigeria invited the EU-EOM to observe the election and it was accredited by the INEC.
- The Justices also dismissed as incompetent Atiku’s witness who presented subpoenaed documents from Chicago State University (CSU) showing Tinubu allegedly committed identity theft, age falsification, certificate forgery, and perjury.
By law, anyone of these allegations about Tinubu’s certificate – if proven – is grounds for his outright disqualification for any public office. But the Justices shielded him by rejecting the witness without delving into the substance of the matter.
Atiku is currently re-litigating in a US court to subpoena the credentials Tinubu has at CSU, which are exactly the same as the ones previously subpoenaed and presented to the PEPC in Abuja, according to papers filed both at the PEPC and the US court.
It remains to be seen whether the Nigerian Supreme Court will take these anomalies into consideration when adjudicating the appeal both Atiku and Obi have vowed to lodge at the top court.