Atiku v Tinubu (1): This is not a petition, it’s mere grouse, Tinubu tells Tribunal

The  All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has told the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) that the petition filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar is not a petition but mere grouse.

Tinubu made the statement in his final written address to the Court of Appeal in the Presidential Election Petition Court holden at Abuja in the matter of the election to the Office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, held on 25th February, 2023.

The Petition with no: CA/PEPC/05/2023, by Abubakar Atiku/Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Tinubu Bola Ahmed, and the All Progressives Congress (APC) as Respondents.

In the introduction to his final written address, Tinubu stated:

The petition in issue in this address is very novel in the sense that it is not a petition stricto senso, familiar to our electoral jurisprudence, as the petitioners are not, this time around, complaining about election rigging, ballot box snatching, ballot box stuffing, violence, thuggery, vote buying, voters’ intimidation, disenfranchisement, interference by the military or the police, and such other electoral vices.

The crux of their grouse in their petition is that this time around, while the presidential election was peacefully conducted all over the country (as corroborated by their primary witnesses; that is, the Presiding Officers-POs) and the results accurately recorded in the various Form EC8As, some unidentified results were not uploaded electronically to the INEC Election Result Viewing (IREV) Portal.

The other remote contention of the petitioners is that the 2nd respondent (respondent) did not score 25% (or one-quarter) of the votes recorded in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja (FCT); while the petitioners have also tersely alluded to the respondent’s non-qualification, without providing any fact of same in the body of their petition.

This written address is presented by the respondent in his defence to the petition against his emergence at the presidential election conducted on 25th February, 2023.

Brief statement of facts

The respondent, a member of the 3rd respondent participated, amongst 17 other candidates, in the election conducted by the 1st respondent into the office of President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on 25th February, 2023, and at the end of the election, he was rightly returned as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, having won a total of 8,794,726 votes ahead of the petitioners, who were his closest rival, though trailing at a distance with the total of 6,984,520 votes. The respondent garnered more than 25% of the total votes cast in 29 States of the Federation, while the petitioners managed to secure same in 21 States of the Federation.

Ironically, the same 1st petitioner who scored 16.13 % of the votes cast at the FCT, as against the higher 19.76% scored by the respondent in the same FCT, is not only praying this Honourable Court to declare him as the winner of the election, but also, making a supplication that the election of the respondent be annulled on the ground that respondent did not score 25% of the votes cast at the FCT. This is just one of the schemes of the petitioners manifesting approbation and reprobation all through.

Largely, the election went very peacefully, under a free and fair atmosphere, without proof in Court of violence, ballot box snatching and such other electoral irregularities and vices; a state of affairs, to which the petitioners’ witnesses all testified. In fact, the election was conducted in substantial compliance with the principles of the Electoral Act, the INEC Regulations and Manuals for the election.

The unchallenged evidence on record, particularly, the sole witness called by the respondent, is that the 1st petitioner has bided, unsuccessfully, for the office of President of Nigeria severally, even till 2019. Coincidentally, a host of the witnesses called by the petitioners corroborated the unstable and or unpredictable nature of technological devices/applications within the Nigerian terrain, as this will be demonstrated anon.

The petition in itself is, with all respect, without any form or substance. It is characterized by repetitions, contradictions and confusion. The petitioners have cynically alleged non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act, on the flimsy ground that the polling unit results were not electronically transmitted and uploaded on the IREV (where collation does not take place) in real time; meanwhile the petitioners did not deny the fact that it is the actual results in the respective polling units that were legitimately transferred to the ward collation centers, through to the local government collation centers, State collation centers and the national collation center. Interestingly, all their witnesses were ad idem in their admission of this sequence of transmission.

The petitioners also claim that the respondent did not emerge with the highest number of lawful votes cast. However, throughout the petition and during trial, at no portion did they state what they considered as the lawful votes cast for both parties and the number of unlawful votes added to the respondent’s, or the number of votes unlawfully deducted from their own votes.

Summary of evidence

The petitioners called a total of 27 witnesses (respectively labelled as PW1-PW27), whose evidence can at best, be described as a panoply of hearsay, admissions against interest, and irrelevancies on the part of the petitioners. Without fear of contradiction, the petitioners have no single witness whose evidence could be described as useful or manageable to their case.

However, out of the abundance of caution, the respondent called a sole witness, whose evidence covered the field. This witness demonstrated undoubted competence to testify in respect of the subjects submitted before the court, including issues surrounding the US proceedings, himself, being a US practicing attorney and counsellor at law.

Also, being a law maker, who participated in the enactment of the Electoral Act, 2022, he stated the position and intention of the legislature, particularly, as it relates to the appropriate mode of transmission as well as transfer and collation of results. Constrained by space, the respondent seeks the indulgence of this Honourable Court to make intermittent references to the evidence of the witnesses, as they apply to the arguments in the body of this written address.