THE Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Atiku Abubakar, yesterday withdrew a fresh application they filed before the Presidential Election Petition Court sitting at the Court of Appeal, Abuja Division. The application sought the court’s nod to compel the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to allow their agents participate in the process of sorting out ballot papers that were used for the presidential election held on February 25.
PDP and Atiku, are separately challenging the outcome of the election which declared the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, as the winner. The petitioners told the court that they were no longer interested in the application.
Atiku, through his team of lawyers led by Joe Gadzama (SAN) told the court that he filed a notice of discontinuance. Speaking on the issue under the condition of anonymity, a member of Atiku’s legal team, said: “We filed the application owing to challenges and administrative bottlenecks we encountered at the INEC office when we went for access to the election materials as ordered by the court. “However, before the application dated March 13 could be slated for hearing, INEC, on its own, called our legal team for a meeting.
“It was at that meeting which held yesterday (Tuesday) that all the grey areas were sorted out, with INEC, pledging to allow our agents to observe the process of sorting out some of the electoral materials we requested for, especially the ballot papers.
“Since that was primarily our prayer in the fresh application we filed, we felt that it would not be necessary to proceed with the hearing. So, to save judicial time, we filed a notice of discontinuance which was accordingly granted”.
The application was consequently struck out by the Justice Joseph Ikyegh-led three-man panel. In the withdrawn application, which was predicated on 11 grounds, Atiku maintained that it was necessary for PDP’s agents to be present during the sorting out of the electoral materials as he would need to prepare a petition he intends to lodge against the outcome of the presidential election.
He added that there was need for his agents to observe/participate in the sorting of materials he requested in all the offices of INEC nationwide, in line with the ex-parte order the court made on March 3.
Atiku argued that allowing the agents of his party to be on the ground while the materials are sorted out, would ensure transparency in the process and guarantee that the ballot papers would not be tampered with.
The tribunal had in the said order, directed INEC to allow the applicants, Atiku and PDP, to inspect, scan, and carry out forensic examination and analysis of the ballot papers, data form, BVAS/and or card readers, including photocopying of the ballot papers, information stored in the computer server/IREV. However, in a subsequent order it made on March 8, the panel gave the electoral body the nod to reconfigure the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, machines it used for the presidential election.
The court held that stopping INEC from reconfiguring the BVAS would adversely affect the conduct of governorship and State Assembly elections billed for Saturday.
The Telegraph
