News
CPC Asks Tribunal to Void
Presidential Election in 20 States
Written by Chuks Ehirim, Abuja
The Congress for Progressive Change [CPC], on Sunday, formally
filed its petition challenging the victory of President Goodluck
Jonathan of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party [PDP], in the
April 16, 2011 Presidential poll.
Speaking to newsmen shortly after filing the petition at the
Court of Appeal, Abuja Division, which serves as the
Presidential Appeal Tribunal, the party's National Chairman,
Prince Tony Momoh, stated that his party is challenging the
results declared by the Independent National Electoral
Commission [INEC]after the election, so as to show the world
that the exercise was fundamentally rigged in favour of the PDP
candidate.
Prince Momoh who personally witnessed the filing processes,
together with his deputy,Alhaji Mustapha Saliu, noted that the
party is asking the tribunal to cancel results of the election
in over 20 states of the Federation, mostly in the South-South,
South-East and in some parts of the South-West as well as the
Northern geo-political zones.
According to him “we are challenging the results in all the
states, all of them are recorded in the petition papers, first
of all, the elections were flawed, marred by malpractices,
corruption ,malpractices, also multiple voting and lots of other
grounds, then we believe that for elections to be free, fair and
transparent, they should not only, be free fair and transparent,
but to be seen to be free fair and transparent''.
“We are not quarrelling with what happened at the polling units
where election took place, and there were lots and lots of
places where election did not take place, we are quarrelling
with the collation that took place, when foreign observers see
people tomb printing, queuing in peace, they said Hallelujah,
free, fair and credible election, but the truth of the matter is
that in their own jurisdictions, once you press the ballot
paper, it registers in a central poll, but here you have to
collect the materials, go to 8000 units at the ward level, go to
780 units at the local government level, and 36 units at the
state level plus Abuja, all those , all those collections,
collations between the polling units and state level were a lot
of manipulations, and we will prove that” he stated.
Momoh pointed out that “we listed the states, mainly
South-South, South-East, some states in the South-West and some
other states in the North; including those areas you thought we
had massive supports. INEC has not been able to give us the
material, but they told us the materials are under their lock
and key, and they will give us when we request and we have
requested''.
Asked what the party's prayers are, he said, ''what we are
asking for is , to nullify the elections in the areas where we
said we have flaws, and of course hold elections in areas where
they are nullified, in the South-South, South-East, areas in the
South-West, even many areas in the north, more than 20 states,
there were a lot of flaws, and we are not just shouting wolf''.
On whether the CPC is still insisting on the forensic analysis
of the ballot papers used during the Presidential election, the
party Chairman answered in the affirmative. ''The anchor is
forensic test, they must subject them to forensic test” he said.
Specifically, the party had, last Friday, in an ex-parte
application filed at the Court of Appeal Tribunal, asked the
court to to compel the Independent National Electoral
Commission (INEC) to seal all the Direct Data Capturing Machines
(DDC) and the ballot boxes used for the presidential elections
in order to preserve them for forensic analysis.
The party said that it was going to subject the DDC machines and
the ballot boxes to forensic test while in the course of arguing
the petition it intended to file to challenge the declaration of
President Jonathan of the Peoples Democratic Party [PDP] as the
winner of the said election.
CPC listed as respondents to the ex-parte application, INEC, its
Chairman, Attahiru Jega, President Jonathan and the Vice
President, Namadi Sambo, as the 1st to 4th Respondents
respectively.
The party also cited as Respondents, the Resident Electoral
Commissioners for the 36 states of the federation and the
Federal Capital Territory [FCT], meaning that the party will be
challenging the results of the presidential polls in all the
states.
CPC also asked the court for an order directing INEC and Jega to
produce for inspection and to allow the party to take copies of
the documents, materials, ballot papers used in the conduct of
the presidential election.
The party asked for an order directing INEC and Jega to allow
access to the petitioners, its lawyers and its biometric experts
access to Biometric Data base of all registered voters in
Nigeria, in the presence of the Respondents for the purpose of
cross-checking the finger prints on the face of the ballot
papers cast in the states, local governments, wards, polling
units so as to compare them with finger prints, entries in the
Biometrics Database already in the custody of the commission.
It also asked the court to direct INEC to provide it with the
list of local contractors engaged by the commission to print
ballot papers used for the presidential election and copies of
contract papers as well as copies of contract papers executed by
INEC as evidence of the contracts awarded by the commission.
Other orders sought by the commission are: An order directing
INEC to provide it with the list of INEC officials and ad hoc
staff containing their names, addresses, occupations and other
designation of the staff used during the election;
*An order directing INEC to provide it with the list of
accredited local and international observers who monitored the
election;
*An order directing INEC to provide CPC with guidelines and
manuals issued by INEC for the conduct of the 2011 general
elections;
*An order directing INEC to provide it with tabulation of ballot
papers distribution evidencing the serial numbers of the ballot
papers shared across the country in polling unit, ward, local
government and states basis;
*An order directing INEC to provide to CPC delineation of
polling units by their codes on the basis of states, federal
constituencies, local government, wards and poling units;
*An order directing INEC to provide it with Un-coded EXCEL
application templates used in computer summation of the result
for the presidential election across the nation on the April
16th, 2011;
*An order directing INEC to provide CPC with all the
thumb-printed ballot papers in all the poling units in all the
states that were used across the nation in the presidential
election;
*And an order directing INEC to provide CPC with the copies of
relevant forms for electoral materials receipts and ballot paper
account and verification statement in which entries of ballot
papers dispatched for the presidential election was recorded.
The party relied on ten grounds upon which it based the
application. It said that it was utterly dissatisfied with the
conduct of the election and that it intended to file a petition
to set aside the declaration by INEC that Jonathan won the
election.
It further stated that unless it was allowed access to the
aforementioned documents, it would not be able to effectively
prosecute the petition.
CPC also stated that all the documents it wanted to inspect were
in the custody of INEC.
In an affidavit deposed to by the National Organising Secretary
of the party Yusuf Salihu he averred that the applicant intends
to file an election petition before the court acting as the
Presidential Elections Tribunal to challenge the declaration of
President Jonathan and Vice President Sambo who were returned by
INEC as the President-Elect and Vice President-Elect
Respectively.
*That the CPC intends to carry out an inspection of the
documents used by the Commission in the conduct of the election
and acquire copies thereof.
*That the documents which the party intends to inspect and
acquire copies are in the custody of the INEC Chairman who is
the Chief Electoral Officer of the Federation.
*That the documents which the applicant to inspect take copies
or access to enable it file the petition include;
*Certified True Copy [CTC] and Electronic Copy of voters
register used in the Presidential election evidencing
accreditation of registered voters.
*All forms EC8 series used for the conduct of the Presidential
Elections evidencing the returns of the result declared
inclusive of forms EC8A, EC8B, EC8C and EC8D that comprises of,
*All the result of all the polling units known form EC8A.
*All collated results in all the wards in all the states subject
of the complaint in this ground otherwise referred to as form
EC8B.
*All collated results of all the Local Government Areas of the
various states subject of the complaint in this ground otherwise
referred to as formsEC8C.
The party further asked for the summary of result collated from
all states by Jega [2nd Respondent] in the otherwise referred to
as forms EC8E, the statement of the declaration of result signed
by the INEc Boss and announced on the 18th of April 2011 showing
the total scores of each of the contestants and its decision to
return President Jonathan [3rd Respondent] as the elected
President of Nigeria.
Other prayers include the tabulation of ballot papers
distribution evidencing the serial numbers of the ballot papers
shared across the country in polling units, wards and polling
unit, local government and states basis.
*Delineation of polling units by their codes on the basis of
states, federal constituencies local governments wards and
polling units.
*Un-coded EXCEL application templates used in computer summation
of the result for the Presidential election across the country
on the16th of April 2011, all the thumb printed ballot papers in
all the polling units in all the states that were used across
the nation in the Presidential election on April 16th 2011.
*Copies of relevant forms for electoral materials and ballot
paper account and verification statement in which entries of
ballot papers dispatched for the Presidential election of the
16th April, 2011 was recorded.
The CPC also asked the court to grant it access, its solicitors
her agents and her biometric experts to the biometric data base
of all registered voters in Nigeria for the purpose of cross
checking the finger prints on the face of the ballot papers cast
in states, local governments, wards, polling units and to
compare them with finger prints, entries in the biometric
database already in the custody of INEC for the purpose of
making analysis for use in evidence before the court.
It alleged that it had written to INEC and the other respondents
demanding for the said items but that the Commission failed to
make the items available even when it had by a letter dated
April 18th 2011 undertaken to do so.
The party pointed out that its case is fundamentally based on
the Direct Data Capturing Machines [DDC Machine] ballot papers
and ballot papers used in the Presidential election.
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