Labour Party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, on Tuesday, tendered reports of the INEC Results Viewing Portal (IReV) at the Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja.
The INEC IReV portal warehouses photographic copies of polling unit result sheets of the 2023 general elections. It is an innovative component of the electoral umpire’s management of the recent polls.
INEC had promised that the polling unit result sheets would be immediately uploaded to the IReV portal after the election was concluded at the various polling centres.
INEC’s failure to keep to the promise triggered uproar from many Nigerians.
The failure formed one of the grounds on which Mr Obi anchored his petition that he filed to challenge the election of President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
According to Mr Obi and his party, the Labour Party, Nigeria’s electoral commission, INEC, in connivance with Mr Tinubu, allegedly stole the 25 February presidential election.
As a result, he urged the five-member panel of the court headed by Haruna Tsammani to overturn Mr Tinubu’s victory.
At the resumption of proceedings in the case on Tuesday, Mr Obi’s lawyer, Peter Afoba, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), tendered IReV reports from five states – Rivers, Akwa-Ibom, Ekiti, Ogun and Adamawa.
Mr Afoba informed the court that the IReV reports were certified by the INEC.
Giving details of the electoral documents, Mr Afoba said the IReV reports were from 21 Local Government Areas of Adamawa State, 20 in Ogun, 16 in Ekiti, 19 in Rivers and 25 in Akwa Ibom.
Contrary to INEC’s declaration, an independent analysis of the IReV portal by PREMIUM TIMES found that Mr Obi, not Mr Tinubu won the presidential election in Rivers State.
But the electoral commission’s lawyer, Kemi Pinheiro, a SAN, and other respondent lawyers for Mr Tinubu and the APC objected to the admissibility of the documents.
They informed the court that their objections would be articulated at the latter part of the suit
More documentary evidence
Another lawyer in Mr Obi’s legal team, Audu Anuga, a SAN, presented more electoral documents comprising reports of complaints over places where voting either did not take place or was cancelled.
Tendering the reports before the court, Mr Anuga said 45 EC40GPU forms (complaint reports) were tendered in 10 Local Government Areas of Niger and 23 in seven Local Government Areas of Osun.
He enumerated others, including – 17 in three Local Government Areas of Edo State and 52 forms in five Local Government Areas of Sokoto State.
The Labour Party lawyer further tendered 15 forms EC40G in 8 Local Government Areas of Osun State and 12 forms EC40G1 in 12 Local Government Areas of Edo.
In addition, Mr Anuga tendered 15 forms EC40G in four council areas of Sokoto and nine forms EC40G1 in two LGAs of Sokoto.
To substantiate his claims of alleged electoral fraud, Mr Obi tendered five reports on the conduct of the polls in Niger and eight in Edo states, respectively.
Again, the respondents’ lawyers opposed the admissibility of the electoral documents.
After the documents were admitted and marked as exhibits, the court adjourned the suit until Wednesday.
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