Drama as INEC, APC disagree over Kogi West primary

                                     
A witness from the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in Abuja, Ibrahim Sanni Mohammed, yesterday, stunned the National Assembly and House of Assembly Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Lokoja, Kogi State when he said the commission monitored the conduct of Kogi West senatorial primary election of the All Progressives Congress, APC.

His report was contrary to the earlier stand of the Kogi INEC, which had at previous tribunal sitting tendered a report that the APC did not conduct primary before it submitted the name of Dino Melaye as its candidate.

However under cross examination by Adeyemi’s counsel, Olakayode Olatoke, the witness said the subpoena summoning him to the court was addressed to him directly rather than to the commission to nominate witness as it ought to be.

The drama occurred at the resumed hearing of the tribunal over the petition filed by Smart Adeyemi challenging the declaration of Senator Dino Melaye as the winner of the March 28 Kogi West senatorial election.

The witness, who said he did not know the INEC official that conducted the primary but was only availed the report of the exercise, also mentioned two different locations where the primary was conducted.

Also under cross examination, the figure of the result submitted by the witness marked exhibit 33-3 were contradictory to the report of the result also presented by the same witness.

Olatoke, however, urged the tribunal not to entertain the submission of the witness, as neither the APC nor Melaye’s counsel have disputed their petition on the no- conduct of primary by APC in any of their responses.

Another witness, Victor Garba of the Department of State Security, DSS, also stunned the court when he could not state the name of the Director General of the agency.

When also asked the name of the Assistant Director of Operations of the DSS in the state, the witness failed to state it.

Counsel to the second respondent, APC, Ayotunde Ogunleye, had brought in Garba as a witness following the subpoena of the tribunal issued to the DSS.

Garba, who said he was the DSS officer attached to the office of INEC in Lokoja, as Security Liaison Officer, told the Justice Akon Ikpeme led tribunal that he was investigating the case of tampering with election materials used for the disputed election.

He had tendered five documents, which include handwritten report of the observation of the verification of the ballot papers, letters from INEC to the DSS asking them to investigate, reports of his findings, observation and investigation of the tampering with ballot papers used for the poll.

However, under cross examination by the petitioner’s counsel, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, the witness who stated that investigation on the incident which started since June was still ongoing, said though some persons have been arrested by the agency nobody could be said to be guilty until the conclusion of investigation, and nobody had been charged to court over the alleged tampering with the election materials.

However, when asked to confirm and prove if he was a staff of the DSS, Garba said he did not come to the court with his identification card and has no means of identification on him.

Garba however told the tribunal that his observations during the recounting of the ballot papers used for the election showed that they had been tampered with, “many of the ballot papers were double printed, while some had multiple thumb printing on them; this rendered the ballot papers invalid”.

He said the high rate of invalidated ballot papers led to the invitation of the service by the Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, in the state to properly investigate the development.