The Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Abuja, on Wednesday, declared that all the witnesses presented by Atiku Abubakar were in Buhari’s favour, Igbere TV reports.
This comes as the Tribunal dismissed most of the petitioner’s claims, insisting that the evidences they relied on, were actually in President Muhammadu Buhari’s favour.
“All the witnesses submitted by the petitioners (Atiku, PDP) were in favour of the respondent (Buhari, APC)”, said Justice Mohammed Garba, chairman of the five-man panel of justices.
On Atiku’s petition challenging Buhari’s academic qualification, the Tribunal said evidences brought to it by the PDP’s witnesses showed that Buhari was indeed qualified to contest the election.
“The petitioners have failed to discharge the burden of proof of the allegation of non-qualification or submission of false information which is fundamental in the aid of the 2nd respondent’s qualification”, the tribunal declared.
Justice Garba added, “I have no doubt in my mind that the petitioners have failed to prove that the second respondent does not possess the qualification to contest the election into the office of the President as stipulated in section 131, 137, 138 of the Constitution.
“I am also of the firm view that the petitioners have failed to prove that the second respondent submitted false information which is fundamental in nature to aid his qualification to contest the election into the Office of the President as prescribed in section 35(1) of the Evidence Act, 2011.
“I come to the conclusion and I resolve issues 1 and 2 against the petitioners,” he added.
He said “the 2nd defendant (Buhari) went through secondary education and then proceeded to military school, as evidently submitted by the petitioners witnesses.”
“The military school is higher than secondary education. A candidate is not required under the Electoral Act to attach his certificate to his Form CF001 before a candidate is adjudged to have the requisite qualification to contest the election” Justice Garba ruled.
Citing a previous Supreme Court judgment, the tribunal said “Submission of educational certificate is not a requirement for qualification to contest election for governor under section 177 Constitution.”
On the use of card readers, the Tribunal said, “Card reader machine has not replaced the voter register. A petitioner must rely on the card reader to prove non-accreditation or over-voting.”
The tribunal ruled that the evidence and report of PW59, witness 59 of the petitioners, cannot be relied on that there was indeed INEC server or servers, as the case may be, into which the results of the presidential election were transmitted.
“It is clear that the results were collated manually”, Justice Garba said.
“The evidence of the five witnesses who claimed that the results were transmitted electronically has no bearing on the requirement of proof expected of the petitioners. It is like a drop in the ocean.
“Electronic voting or transmission of results have no statutory backing. The mode of voting and collation of results have not changed from being manual since 2015”, said Justice Garba.
Justice Garba recalled the 2015 judgment of the Supreme Court which held that card readers were only recognised for use to authenticate the owner of the voter card.
