JUDGEMENT DAY FOR TINUBU, ATIKU, OBI

Akani Alaka

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is in faraway New Delhi, India, attending a meeting of the G-20 leaders with top officials of his government and the top echelon of Nigerian business leaders.
But it is doubtful if the president will be able to concentrate on his assignment in the Asian country at least for the early part of Wednesday.
His attention, like that of others on the trip with him, will be in Abuja, especially, in the Court of Appeal which is just some metres away from the Aso Rock presidential villa he had occupied as his office since 29th May, 2023. There, five judges, led by Justice Tsammani will deliver a verdict that may put his continued stay in Aso Rock in jeopardy.
Though he may appeal to the Supreme Court if the judgement does not go his way, an unfavourable verdict will mean that Tinubu will return to the country in ignominy.

Tinubu Not Worried

Presidential spokesman, Ajuri Ngelale said his boss was not worried about the judgment because he won the election.
“The President sees no need to threaten judicial officers. He sees no need to raise speculations against the integrity of judicial officers; he believes in the sanctity and integrity of the Nigerian judicial system, and he believes the great men and women on the panel will make their decisions based only on the facts before them.
“He will continue to ensure that no matter what the outcome of the judgment is, he does his part and ensures that our institutions continue to be respected, not just by him, but all actors,” Ngelale added.
But while the president will be hoping for a verdict that will guarantee his stay as the chief tenant of Aso Rock. Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and Peter Obi of the Labour Party will also be separately hoping that the five-member panel’s decision will help advance their presidential ambitions.

Police Ready For Troublemakers

Supporters of the two presidential candidates have been very upbeat since the announcement that the Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC will deliver its judgment on the petitions filed against the declaration of Tinubu as the winner of the 25 February poll on Wednesday.
The announcement set social media platforms on fire with some of the supporters of the opposition candidates suggesting that they may go violent if what they regard as ‘justice’ is not done by the PEPC.
Despite the announcement that the judgment will be televised and access to the courtroom restricted, some of the supporters of the candidates have been busy mobilising people to ensure that are physically present at the PEPC. The threats of violence have put the security operatives on edge.
The Nigerian Xpress learnt on Tuesday that the Department of State Services, DSS and the military are strategising on how to respond to any outbreak of violence over the verdict of the tribunal.
In reaction, the Police warned that its men will be all out to ensure that the peace of the country is not disrupted over the verdict of the PEPC.
Spokesperson for the Nigeria Police, Muyiwa Adejobi warned politicians and those he referred to as mischief makers against misinformation and unguided utterances capable of inciting violence.
Adejobi said the police will deploy operatives across the length and breadth of Nigeria to forestall the breakdown of law and order.
“The Police wish to reiterate the commitment to ensuring the safety of lives and property before, during, and after the judgment. The NPF has diligently emplaced all necessary deployments and security measures during this critical period as officers and men are fully prepared to maintain order and enforce laws while respecting the rights and freedoms of all citizens,” Adejobi said.

The Road To Tribunal

Mahmood Yakubu, the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had on 31 March declared Tinubu the winner of the 2023 presidential election contested by 18 candidates.
Tinubu, who contested on the platform of APC  secured a total of 8,794,726 votes to win the election. Atiku and Obi had 6,984,520 votes and 6,101,533 votes respectively to come second and third in the election.
“I, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, hereby certify that I am the returning officer for the 2023 general election. The election was contested.
“That Tinubu Bola Ahmed of the APC, having certified the requirements of the law, is hereby declared the winner and is returned,” the INEC chairman said to cheers from supporters of the victorious party in the early morning announcement.
For Tinubu, a former senator who left office as a two-term governor of Lagos State in 2007 and is credited with leading the coalition that ousted the PDP from power in 2015, the declaration by INEC was a realisation of a lifelong ambition.
However, the LP and the PDP and their candidates cried foul. Indeed, they had indicated that they would challenge the outcome of the election even as results were still trickling in over alleged irregularities.
Dino Melaye, the representative of the PDP had after the INEC chairman failed to accede to his request to halt the collation staged a walkout at the International Conference Centre, Abuja venue of the event.
The LP and PDP and their candidates had also at press conferences they held after the announcement of the result vowed that the declaration of Tinubu as the winner would not stand.
Indeed, some supporters of Obi had filed multiple lawsuits, asking the courts to stop the swearing-in of Tinubu into office until the tribunal delivered verdict on the challenge to his victory.
But the courts threw out the cases, thus paving the way for Tinubu to assume office as Nigeria’s 16th president on 29th May.

Obi, Atiku Cases Against Tinubu 

Then, the battle for the two candidates to regain what they described as their mandates shifted to the PEPC.
Aside from Atiku, Obi and their parties, the Allied Peoples Movement, (APM) also filed and sustained their petitions against Tinubu during the hearing of the petitions.
The parties – the petitioners and the respondents closed their cases in late June. Abubakar closed his case after calling 27 out of the 100 witnesses he had indicated he would call at the commencement of the sitting of the tribunal and tendered electoral documents. Obi called 13 witnesses.

Tinubu, Vice President Kashim Shettima also closed the defence in the petition filed by Obi after calling one witness instead of the 39 they indicated that they would call.

The two parties said Tinubu is not qualified to contest the election, citing the over $400 million the president forfeited to the US government over alleged involvement in a drug case. They also raised questions about Tinubu’s certificates and educational background.

The petitioners also tendered thousands of mutilated and unreadable copies of the election results allegedly downloaded from the Irev portal of INEC.

They also claimed that Tinubu’s failure to score 25 per cent of votes cast in FCT was another reason he should not have been declared the winner of the election.

They called experts to prove their case. The APM had also argued that Tinubu should be disqualified because he did not properly replace the candidate he put as a placeholder for his deputy before INEC’s deadline to do so.

In the same vein, LP and Obi claimed Shettima did not properly withdraw from the senatorial contest before he was put forward by Tinubu as his running mate.

They, therefore, called for the nullification of Tinubu’s candidacy on this score. In their final written address, Atiku and the PDP through their team of lawyers led by Chief Chris Uche, SAN, asked the court to declare that President Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election.

They asked the court to declare Atiku the winner or to nullify the result and order a re-run or fresh contest in which Tinubu would be barred. They faulted INEC’s conduct of the election, alleging that the commission deliberately bypassed all the technological innovations it introduced for the 2023 general elections.
They also said the commission acted in breach of the amended Electoral Act by allegedly refusing to electronically transmit the results of the presidential election.

PDP and Atiku showed video clips where the INEC chairman promised that the result of the election would be transmitted to the iRev portal to support their case.
They also noted that while the results of the National Assembly elections conducted on the same day were seamlessly transmitted to iRev, there were unusual hiccups in the transmission of the results of the presidential election.
“It is our contention and it is here in evidence that witnesses admitted that results from the National Assembly election were transmitted but that of the presidential election was not. My Lords, in a situation like this, the burden shifts on INEC to explain. It is not on the petitioner to explain why there was such a technical glitch.
”We urge this court to hold that there was a deliberate non-compliance. The substantiality of the non-compliance lies in the national spread of the non-transmission of results. It was national and not limited to certain polling units,” Uche added.
Also, in their final brief of argument, Obi and the LP, through their lawyer, Mr Livy Uzoukwu, SAN, argued that the glitch in the transmission of the presidential election result was an intentional act to sabotage the outcome of the poll.
They also pointed out that over 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC’s iRev portal, hence, the election was certainly flawed.

Tinubu Won

But INEC, Tinubu, Shettima and APC prayed the court to dismiss the petitions as grossly lacking in merit. INEC’s legal team, led by Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, said the presidential election was conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.

The vommission noted that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, device was introduced for the authentication and verification of voters and transmission of results from the polling units to the iRev portal and not as a substitute for manual collation of results.

The commission also said it was illogical for the petitioners to claim that a candidate must secure 25 per cent votes in the FCT to be declared winner of a presidential election. INEC’s counsel said such assertions run contrary to the spirit and intendment of the drafters of the 1999 Constitution, as amended.
He said FCT ought to be regarded as the 37th state of the federation that is without a special status during elections.

Also, Tinubu and Shettima in their written address, urged the court to dismiss all the petitions.
The president’s lead counsel, Wole Olanipekun, among others, argued that the petitioners completely failed to discharge the burden of proof that was required of them by the law in their petitions. Olanipekun accused Atiku and Obi of merely dumping documents before the court.

The SAN also argued that his clients won one-third of the votes in the FCT. He added that Obi had no locus to challenge the outcome of the election since his name was not found on the register of the LP.
APC’s counsel, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, argued that Tinubu scored over 25 per cent in about 29 states and should be declared winner of the election as  “to do otherwise will amount to constitutional absurdity.”
He further noted that all the issues the petitioners raised against President Tinubu have all been decided by various courts. “There is hardly any point agitated by the petitioners that has not received judicial pronouncement and resolution,” he said.

No Need For Blackmail 

As it is, the die is cast and Nigerians and indeed the global community will before the end of Wednesday know whose arguments the five-member panel will go with.
But it is not the end of the road for the parties as they will still have another opportunity to vent their grievances if they are not satisfied.
Lagos lawyer Femi  Falana said this while noting that the judiciary has been subjected to unprecedented blackmail and intimidation over the presidential election petitions, the kind not witnessed in the country before.

“We have been having election petitions since the colonial era, but none has attracted such level of blackmail and intimidation of the judiciary.
“I am worried that people give the impression that everything ends with the judgement of the Court of Appeal, the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal.
“As they say, even if the heavens will fall and the heavens won’t fall anyway, the judges must not be intimidated, they must give their decision regardless of blackmail or intimidation convinced that they can justify their judgement.

“That is what is required of them, to examine the evidence, apply the law and deliver a decision. One way or the other, some will lose, some will win, but those who lose in the case and are aggrieved will have another opportunity to approach the Supreme Court and demonstrate how the Court of Appeal has erred,” Falana said.