The Edo Governorship Election Petition Tribunal has reserved judgment in the petition filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and it’s governorship candidate, Asue Ighodalo, challenging the outcome of the governorship election in the state.
The three-member panel led by Justice Wilfred Kpochi reserved the judgment after counsel in the matter adopted their final written addresses.
According to Justice Kpochi, a date for judgment will be communicated to parties by the secretary of the tribunal.
At the resumed hearing, counsel to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Kanu Agabi, prayed the tribunal to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit on grounds that annulment of the governorship election was not one of the reliefs sought by the petitioners.
He also argued that the number of polling unit agents called as witnesses represented an insignificant percent of the number of polling units in Edo.
The counsel to the governor, Onyechi Ikpeazu, told the tribunal to dismiss the petition on the grounds that it had become an academic exercise.
He said that in the course of their research, they carefully extracted the polling units for which the petitioners tendered documents and compared them to the ones they presented, and his client was well ahead of the petitioner in the polls.
On form EC25B where the petitioners claimed the serial numbers of sensitive materials must be given, Ikpeazu said that all that was required for the form was the quantity of electoral materials received, and quantity returned.
According to him, the petitioners, not tendering the right documents, failed to prove overvoting on the whole.
Responding, counsel to the petitioners, Ken Moze, said that with 4,519 polling units in Edo, the complaint in the petition concerned 765 of them.
According to him, it is law that successful prosecution of election petition is not about the percentage of the total polling units in the state but the effect of the successive establishment of the complaint.
He further argued that the petition must be considered holistically and not in parts.
On the issue of not presenting the tribunal with an alternative result, the senior lawyer said that it was on record that all the results before the tribunal were tendered by his client.
On why the petitioners called only five polling unit agents, he said that the grouse of his client was with what happened at the collation centres and not at the polling units so they didn’t need more than five agents to testify.
Speaking on the claim that they dumped documents on the tribunal, Moze said that all the documents they tendered were duly certified by INEC and were tendered without objection from the commission.
He also held that the tribunal had the jurisdiction to hear the petition because their allegations were not pre-election matters.
After hearing all the arguments, Justice Kpochi reserved judgment in the matter to a date to be communicated to the parties by the secretary of the tribunal.
The PDP and its governorship candidate, mister asue ighodalo, approached the tribunal, praying for it to invalidate the outcome of the governorship election on the grounds of alleged non-compliance with the Electoral Act of 2022.
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