July 04, (THEWILL) – The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has closed its defence in the joint petition filed by the Labour Party (LP) and its presidential candidate in the February 25 Presidential election, Peter Obi.
The Electoral umpire, through its counsel, Abubakar Mahmoud (SAN), closed the defence on Tuesday, after presenting one witness, Dr. Laurence Bayode, who is an Information Technology practitioner with the INEC to testify before the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) sitting in Abuja.
Mahmoud tendered five documents including certified true copies of APC’s letter of 6th July 2022, INEC’s acknowledgement, INEC’s guidelines and regulations for the 2023 election among others, to the court to defend his case.
The documents were admitted as exhibits by Justice Haruna Tsamani’s led panel.
Under cross-examination by Wole Olanipekum (SAN), counsel to President Bola Tinubu, the INEC’s witness informed the court that the technical glitch experienced during the uploading of the results did not affect the authenticity of the results.
He said the physically collated results remained authentic and unchanged. The witness confirmed that the ECOWAS report on the election affirmed its authenticity.
Continuing his evidence in chief under cross-examination, counsel to the Labour Party and its presidential candidate, Patrick Ikweto (SAN), asked the witness to confirm the cloud trails of the specific events, time, source and IP address among others, which the witness denied.
The witness said the hard copy of election results obtained at polling units and uploaded to IREV should be the same and cannot affect the collation of results. The INEC staff confirmed the blurry images when he was shown election results picked at random.
Dr. Bayode also informed the court of the difference between the performance and functionality tests conducted on the INEC e-transmission portal, as well as the vulnerability test on the back-end server.
After taking the cross-examination of the INEC witness, Justice Haruna Simon Tsamani adjourned to 5th July for continuation of the defence against the petition by Peter Obi and the Labour Party.
Meanwhile, President Bola Tinubu and Vice President Kashim Shettima will open their defence on Wednesday, July 5, 2023, in the joint petition filed by the LP and Obi.
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