Labour Party has closed its case at the Presidential Election Petition Court.
POLITICS NIGERIA reports that during the proceedings, the party reportedly presented 13 witnesses, falling short of the initially stated intention to call 50 witnesses.
The Labour Party’s challenge centres around the declaration of Bola Tinubu, the candidate from the All Progressives Congress (APC), as the winner of the election by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
According to the party, Tinubu failed to meet the constitutional requirement of securing 25% of the votes in at least two-thirds of the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, as mandated by INEC.
In the election, Tinubu garnered 8,794,726 votes, while Atiku Abubakar from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) secured 6,984,520 votes. The Labour Party’s candidate, Peter Obi, concluded the race with a tally of 6,101,533 votes.
Obi, the candidate of Labour Party, submitted various exhibits to support his claims. These included polling unit results from all 36 states of the federation, as well as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. Additionally, he presented a bundle of documents containing the total number of Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs) collected in 32 states prior to the 2023 general elections.
In his submission, Obi included four video exhibits, including a press conference featuring the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmoud Yakubu. At the conference, Yakubu assured the public that the election results would be electronically transmitted to the IReV portal in real-time, utilising the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machines. Alongside these videos, Obi and the Labour Party tendered a bundle of documents revealing the total number of registered voters in each state.
The court also admitted additional electoral documents as evidence, which included certified true copies of INEC Forms EC40Gs, EC40G1, and EC40GPU. These forms contained reports from various polling units where elections did not take place.
While all the respondents challenged the admissibility of the presented documents, they expressed their intention to provide detailed objections in their final written address.
