INEC attacks own document in court as Labour Party overwhelms court with evidence
Get real time updates directly on you device, subscribe now.
There was an open consternation at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal on Thursday as the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC) openly objected to the admissibility of Certified True Copies (CTC) of its own documents.
Counsel to INEC attacked their own document presented in court as the Labour Party (LP) overwhelmed the court with documentary evidence of malpractices, errors, alterations, inconsistencies INEC did on election results during the presidential election held on February 25, 2023.
News Band had, after extensive analysis, discovered and made a publication on May 5, 2023, revealing a gamut of errors, alterations, and inconsistencies perpetrated by the Electoral Commission in the results of the presidential election, even on its website.
In the report, it was revealed that form EC8A were not available in several polling units in some states, while in others, in polling units where form EC8A were available, the uploaded results did not match the named polling units.
In other instances, most registrations (figures) recorded in INEC website are different from the figures recorded in form EC8A.
Also, election results collated via INEC Results Viewing (IREV) portal, with the exception of blurred uploads and altered results, are totally different from the results declared by INEC.
Read the full report below:
ANALYSIS: Errors, alterations, inconsistencies INEC did on election results and on its website – News Band
Counsel to Peter Obi and the Labour Party, Thursday, presented boxes containing documentary evidence of INEC’s malpractices, errors, alterations and inconsistencies.
Reacting to INEC’s attitude after it rejected Certified True Copies (CTC) of its own documents, a public interest and human rights lawyer, Barrister Inibehe Effiong, lambasted the Commission, describing the attitude as roguish, embarrassing and a distraction.
Barrister Effiong, however, assured that the Court will still act on them as they emanated from a real source.
Related Posts
He said: “Ordinarily, INEC being the maker of the documents which they’ve certified, that is Form EC8 series (polling unit & collation results), they’re not supposed to object to their admissibility.”
It could be recalled that the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, on Wednesday, similarly objected to the admission of documents from the Bi-Modal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) by the court.
Tinubu, through his team of lawyers led by Wole Olanipekun, SAN, challenged the admissibility of certified copies of printouts from the BVAS, which were brought before the Presidential Election Petition Court sitting in Abuja, by candidate of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar.
INEC followed suit on Thursday, objecting to the admission of it’s own certified document in court.
Some Nigerians have, meanwhile, expressed concerns over the safety of the submitted documents going by incidences whereby the APC presidential candidate was accused of destroying evidence by setting a court on fire in a case involving Alpha Beta in Lagos. Read more.
