INEC Plans To Erase The Most Important Evidence In Support Of The Election Petitions — Obi’s Counsel, Onyechi Ikpeazu, SAN, Alleges

The counsel for Mr. Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party at the recently concluded General Elections, Onyechi Ikpeazu, SAN, has commented on the application brought by INEC to the Presidential Election Tribunal.

While speaking to newsmen in Abuja on Tuesday, 7^th of March, said;

“There are two applications of interest. One is the application brought by INEC to vary the order, according to them, the order which enables us to scan the ballot papers will expose the identity of the voters and persons they have voted for. But we are saying that is not the objective of the applicant. That all we needed to do is to verify that they were not in questions and that we have no interest whatsoever.” According to the learned senior advocate of Nigeria, he further stated that the order brought by INEC is “…pedestrian and diversionary”.

The other application which is of utmost importance is that INEC was seeking to reconfigure the BVAS machine ahead of the governorship elections. That they intend to wipe out the accreditation data captured for the presidential election. He considered this to be very serious and huge. Recounting his experience at the Osun governorship tribunal and how they got the order of the tribunal to check the BVAS machine which they did and discovered that they were no over voters.

He mentioned that the information on the BVAS is the most important evidence in the entire election petition proceedings. On the timing between the checking and the governorship election considering that the timing is very short

“First of all, you need to look at the importance of the presidential election and the importance of the votes cast and the integrity of the process.  I believe the issue of time should not be of any relevance and it can always be postponed. I mean this is not the first time an election is postponed in Nigeria.”