PEPT: ‘Emotional blackmail,’ as Nigerians bicker over Tinubu’s ‘anarchy and chaos’ threat

Reactions have continued to trail the final written addresses filed by the respondents following the commencement of proceedings at Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT) sitting at the Court of Appeal Headquarters, in Abuja, Friday.

The respondents, including the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), President Bola Tinubu, Vice President Kashim Shettima and the All Progressives Congress (APC), who are the first, second, third and fourth, respectively, are defending their cases in the petition filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Atiku Abubakar, along with the Labour Party (LP) and its flagbearer in the disputed February 25 poll, Peter Obi.

Proceedings at the PEPT closed surprisingly after the respondents agreed to end their defence with a sole witness in the stands during penultimate Wednesday, July 5 hearing.

The PEPT then ruled to adjourn further proceedings till a later date to begin hearing on written addresses by petitioners and replies by respondents at a date to be communicated to all parties.

During Wednesday’s proceedings, the respondents, including President Bola Tinubu, Vice President Shettima, and the APC, closed their defence after calling Senator Mike Opeyemi Bamidele as witness to the stand.

The court at its last sitting on July 5 had ended with the closing of the defence by the respondents, as the Tribunal Chairman, Justice Haruna Tsammani gave the respondents 10 days to file their final written addresses backing their defence against the charges by the petitioners, PDP, Atiku, LP and Obi.

The petitioners are challenging the declaration by INEC of Bola Tinubu of the APC as winner of the February 25, 2023 presidential elections in Nigeria, announced on March 1.

While INEC, Tinubu, Shettima and the APC counsels will get 10 days starting from Wednesday, July 5 to submit their final written address, the LP and PDP as petitioners will have a subsequent 7-day period to file a response, immediately after the respondents had done theirs.

Following that, the respondents will have 5 days to respond.

Meanwhile, Tinubu and Shettima’s lead counsel, Mr Olanipekun SAN had informed the court that all respondents will file10 pages separately, which translates into 40 pages by all respondents.

However, controversy took over after Tinubu’s lead counsel, Mr Wole Olanipekun SAN, had in his final written address before the PEPT reportedly warned the court that subversion of the will of the voters ‘will lead to anarchy and chaos’ in the country.

This was largely interpreted to mean a threat to the judges of the PEPT, by many just as others have claimed that the Mr Olanipekun did not state those words in his address.

Subsequently, Nigerians have stormed the social media platform of Twitter to vent their rage against Tinubu’s perceived threat, as his supporters and sympathizers alike threat stand in his defence.

Mr Olanipekun, speaking for Tinubu in his written address admitted his failure to score 25 per cent of votes cast in Nigeria’s capital Abuja, but said it was insufficient to overturn his victory as declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

“Any other interpretation different from this will lead to absurdity, chaos, anarchy and alteration of the very intention of the legislature,” the final defence statement to the court read.

The lawyers were specifically addressing a section of the Nigerian Constitution that said a presidential candidate must score 25 per cent of votes in two-thirds of Nigeria’s 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, or Abuja.

“Even if there was no election in one State (including the FCT), or even if the election of a State/States (including the FCT) is/are voided, the entire election cannot be voided or canceled.

“In concluding our arguments on this issue, we urge the court to hold that any election where the electorate exercise their plebiscite, there is neither a ‘royal’ ballot nor ‘royal’ voter; and that residents of the FCT do not have any special voting right over residents of any other State of the federation, in a manner similar to the concepts of preferential shareholding in Company Law.

“We urge this court to resolve this issue against the petitioners and in favour of the respondent,” the lawyers said.

For the President’s backers, the statement credited to him is fake, as they insist that Olanipekun had said: “Ruling that the votes of some Nigerians are of greater value than that of other Nigerians will introduce chaos into the electoral system and betray the intent of the constitution,” in his written address, and not the threat credited to him in the media.

Below are some of the responses captured by Oracle Today newspaper from the Twitter platforms.

Babatunde Gbadamosi (@BOGbadams):

This is a President? Openly threatening the judiciary because he knows his presence in that seat cannot be justified constitutionally is just par for the course for a drug lord.

I say bring the chaos. Nigerians are ready this time. You will not live to tell the tale if you are removed by the tribunal and you start any nonsense. Do anyhow, you will see anyhow, walahi!

With that said, if this man is not removed by the judiciary, they and their families will regret their decision for generations.

Their generations yet unborn will curse their memories, because the suffering he will bring to Nigerians for his personal enrichment and that of his family has just started doing press-ups.

BigwigAustin (aai-austin):

So they should uphold illegality because Nigerians are elastic they always expand when stretched abi?

Do your jobs sirs!

Kalu Aja @(FinPlanKaluAja1):

The President of the Largest economy in Africa is telling foreign investors that if the courts, in a legal ruling in his own nation, remove him from office because he failed to meet the conditions set by his nation to become president, there will be anarchy and chaos.

In essence, if he is allowed to break the law and remain in office in contravention of the legal rules of his nation, against the oath of office he took, there will be no chaos and anarchy.

Toyins (@toyinscharles):

Dont join them to tweet this when you can read the defence tabled to the court

PBAT’s legal team: “Ruling that the votes of some Nigerians are of greater value than that of other Nigerians will introduce chaos into the electoral system and betray the intent of the constitution.”

Irresponsible media outlet: “Tinubu threatens Tribunal ..

The media must do better…

IamEriOluwa

That was definitely offside statement. He shouldn’t have uttered that statement.

agbomabiwon(@akin_akintola)

But Tinubu did not say this word and many have taken the word out of context.

If the 25% FCT law is allowed to stand, it will affect future elections in the country which will cause chaos which is exactly what the law was made to prevent in the first place.

egieoye valentine (@SaintValentine_)

Tell them to show the video where that statement was uttered.

Weyimi B. Lube (@_weyimi)

He didn’t get 25% which he has admitted, now he is coming out to say anarchy may loom if he is removed as president. Tinubu isn’t a demi-God that will make us tremble, the sky won’t fall, and the earth won’t erupt. Nigeria isn’t a toy house and Nigerians aren’t toys to toss around. Bullying Nigerians won’t work! Failed attempt of a boogie man.

He must have said “Nothing will happen, they will all fall in line” The audacity of him to think he can control us to dance to his tunes. This time we will let all the people who have abused democracy know that they can’t get away with it.

(@General_Oluchi)

This has always been the plan with Mahmood Yakubu. Tinubu must have told him to announce him as the winner and he will take care of the rest, but he was greatly misinformed and he will learn soon enough that this is not 2015!

Daniel Adaji (@adajidaniel14a1)

Because of this 25% issue, Tinubu has been pumping money into the judiciary. That’s open bribery. We need to start calling this out. The earlier the better.

David Hundeyin (@DavidHundeyin)

No more attempt at trying to be presidential anymore. Back to his agbero roots. Threatening a whole country.

M.O.B (@Mykoladoo)

BAT should know that it’s not just the FCT 25% but other truck loads of other incriminating runz he pulled.

Forfeiture

Fake result

Fake identity

Fake Bio etc

Rinu Oduala (@SavvyRinu)

Any anarchy that happens in Nigeria because of Tinubu is sponsored.

APC thugs who were unleashed in the 2023 elections are again being rallied for another wave of violence.

This time, Nigerians will meet you on the streets.

The PDP and LB now have one week to file their replies at the PEPT.

It would be recalled that in the written defence filed by the respondents and dated July 14, their counsels had asked the court to dismiss the two petitions by PDP and LP on the grounds that the latter were not familiar with the country’s electoral laws.

“The petition in issue in this address is very novel in the sense that it is not a petition stricto senso, familiar to our electoral jurisprudence, as the petitioners are not, this time around, complaining about election rigging, ballot box snatching, ballot box stuffing, violence, thuggery, vote buying, voters’ intimidation, disenfranchisement, interference by the military or the police, and such other electoral vices.

“The crux of their grouse this time around is that while the presidential election was peacefully conducted all over the country (as corroborated by their primary witnesses) and the results accurately recorded in the various Form EC8As, some unidentified results were not uploaded electronically to the INEC Election Result Viewing (IREV) Portal.

“The other remote contention of the petitioners is that the 2nd respondent did not score 25% (or one-quarter) of the votes recorded in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja (FCT); while the petitioners have also alluded to the respondent’s non-qualification, without any fact known to law”, Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN, counsel to Tinubu had pointed out in the final address dated July 14. Both Atiku and Obi claimed INEC breached Section 134 of the Constitution when he announced Tinubu who did not score up to 25% of votes cast in the FCT in line with the law. Section 134(2)(b) of the Constitution provides that:“

A candidate for an election to the office of President shall be deemed to have been duly elected where there being more than two candidates for the election- (a) he has the highest number of votes cast at the election; and (b) he has not less than one-quarter of the votes cast at the election each of at least two-thirds of all the States in the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.”

According to the INEC results Tinubu was only able to garner 19% of votes in the FCT. He, however, argued that it was erroneous for the petitioners to call for the nullification of the entire election based on the FCT results.

“While we have premised this issue on the combined reading of sections 134 and 299 of the Constitution, and section 66 of the Electoral Act, in the course of our arguments … t is apt to submit right from get-go that election is about votes and voters, and when votes and voters are mentioned in any part of the world, there is no superiority of votes or voters as all votes and voters are equal”, adding that there is no superiority between the votes from voters secured in either Lagos or Kano, which are the most populous States and Bayelsa, Ebonyi and Ekiti, which are the least populous States.

Olanipekun further argued that, while Section 3(1) of the Constitution specifically lists the 36 States by their respective names, the sidenote reads thus: “States of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.”

Section 299, for ease of reference and clarity, provides thus: “The provisions of this Constitution shall apply to the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja as if it were one of the States of the Federation…” The phrase ‘as if’ has been defined in Corpus Juris Secundum, page 298 as connoting “in the same manner and to the same extent.” 

“May we draw the attention of the court to the fact that there is no punctuation (comma) in the entire section 134(2)(b) of the Constitution, particularly, immediately after the ‘States’ and the succeeding ‘and’ connecting the Federal Capital Territory with the States. In essence, the reading of the subsection has to be conjunctive and not disjunctive, as the Constitution clearly makes it so. Pressed further, by this constitutional imperative, the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, is taken ‘as if’ it is the 37th State, under and by virtue of section 299 of the Constitution. 

“With much respect, any other interpretation different from this will lead to absurdity, chaos, anarchy and alteration of the very intention of the legislature. Our courts have always adopted the purposeful approach to the interpretation of our Constitution, as exemplified in a host of decisions, including but not limited to Nafiu Rabiu v. State (1980) 12 NSCC 291 at 300-301,  Marwa v Nyako (2012) 6 NWLR (Pt. 1296) 199, 306 – 307, ADH Limited v AT Limited (2006) 10 NWLR (Pt. 986) 635, 649, Awolowo v. Shagari (supra),  Abraham Adesanya v. President, Federal Republic of Nigeria (1981) 12 NSCC 146 at 167-168; A.G Abia v. A.G Federation (2002) 6 NWLR (Pt. 763) 265 at 365.

“The petitioners themselves admit this much in paragraph 107 of their petition, where they listed the FCT as the 37th State, after listing the States mentioned in section 3(1), as numbers 1 to 36. Again, the maxim, res ipsa loquitur applies to the petitioners. 

“Coincidentally, these sections of the Constitution were considered by the Supreme Court in the celebrated case of Buhari v. Obasanjo (2005) 13 NWLR (Pt. 941) 1 at 105 and the apex court held thus:“This provision appears clear to me. Where a candidate wins the highest number of votes cast in at least two-thirds of the 36 States in the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory Abuja, he is deemed to be elected …I do appreciate any ambiguity in the provision and even if there was one, this court is bound to adopt a construction which is just, reasonable and sensible. (See Maxwell on the Interpretation of Statutes, 12th Edition, Chapter 10).

“In my view, it would lead to absurdity and manifest injustice to nullify the election for the entire nation because of the nullification (sic) of the election of one State, some Local Government Areas, Wards and Units. Such a devastating result could hardly have been contemplated by the framers of the Constitution.

“It is my conclusion therefore that the cancellation of the election in Ogun State and the other smaller components does not substantially affect the election of the 1st and 2nd respondents. In the event, this petition fails and same is dismissed with costs which I assess at N5,000 in favour of each set of respondents.”

Olanipekun submitted that from the apex court’s judgment above, it could be seen, “That even if results of elections are canceled in more than one State (including the FCT), that election is not rendered invalid, provided, the winning candidate meets the constitutional requirements of one-quarter of the votes cast in two-thirds of the 37 States contemplated.

“Anything to the contrary would be devastating, and such was never contemplated by the framers of the Constitution.  

“All the winning candidate needs is a majority of the votes, and even if there was no election in one State (including the FCT), or even if the election of a State/States (including the FCT) is/are voided, the entire election cannot be voided or canceled. 

“In concluding our arguments on this issue, we urge the court to hold that any election where the electorate exercise their plebiscite, there is neither a ‘royal’ ballot nor ‘royal’ voter; and that residents of the FCT do not have any special voting right over residents of any other State of the federation, in a manner similar to the concepts of preferential shareholding in Company Law. We urge this court to resolve this issue against the petitioners and in favour of the respondent”, he pleaded.

Faulting the entire petition, Olanipekun, urged that, “based on the arguments and submissions contained in this address” the Court should “dismiss this petition as totally lacking in merit, substance and bona fide. It has been glaringly shown and demonstrated by the presentation of the petition itself and the evidence presented by the petitioners, including the evidence of PW27, that the petition itself is not only frivolous but also amounts to a crass abuse of the process of the court. Non-existent documents were being sourced and printed from the internet, among others, to be presented before this court, after the filing of the petition, in furtherance of the abusive nature of the petition itself”. According to him, it was glaringly evident that the election went very peacefully, under a free and fair atmosphere, “without proof in Court of violence, ballot box snatching and such other electoral irregularities and vices; a state of affairs, to which the petitioners’ witnesses all testified. “In fact, the election was conducted in substantial compliance with the principles of the Electoral Act, the INEC Regulations and Manuals for the election. The unchallenged evidence on record, particularly, the sole witness called by the respondent, is that the 1st petitioner has bided, unsuccessfully, for the office of President of Nigeria severally, even till 2019. On the controversial issue of electronic transmission of results using the Bi-modal Verification Accreditation System (BVAS), Olanipekun said, “Coincidentally, a host of the witnesses called by the petitioners corroborated the unstable and or unpredictable nature of technological devices/applications within the Nigerian terrain, as this will be demonstrated anon”.  The senior lawyer pointed out that it was wrong for the petitioners to build their case only on electronic transmission as the law also recognizes manual transmission.

“Our clear submission is that all the provisions of the Regulations created the alternative between electronic transmission and transfer, with the use of the article “or”.

For instance, paragraph 38(i), which deals with movement from the polling unit states that “on completion of all the Polling Unit voting and results procedures, the Presiding Officer shall: (i) Electronically transmit or transfer the result of the Polling Unit, direct to the collation system as prescribed by the Commission.”

Tinubu while faulting the evidence of the 40 witnesses called by both Attiku and Obi, claimed their testimonies rather complimented the case of the respondents. “The evidence of these witnesses essentially centers round the function of the BVAS and IREV and ultimately seek to impeach the veracity of INEC’s explanation about the technological glitches that occurred on the day of the election and its implication on the overall results of the election.

“Without equivocation, it is our respectful submission that the petitioners have woefully failed in this adventure of theirs and this will be seen through the direct analysis of their respective evidence. The evidence of PW2 is largely irrelevant for the benefit of the petition, as his witness statement on oath only attempted to outline the various features and functions of the BVAS; the involvement of the Amazon Web Service (AWS) and its corporate profile; as well as the description of the IREV, its workings and configurations.

“However, despite the supposed authoritative assertions of this witness in respect of the BVAS and the IREV, under cross examination, he confessed that he is not familiar with the applications on the BVAS device and that as a software engineer, he has never designed any software that was applied for the conduct of any general election. Though this witness had made several assertions in respect of the AWS in his witness statement, in all fairness to him, he opened up that he is not a staff of AWS.

“Similarly, the witness confessed that he was not aware of the number of software that makes the components that INEC used for the 2023 general election, as he is not an INEC staff, admitting that he never had any of the materials he used for his supposed findings before the court, but on his laptop which was not made available to the court. The irony about this witness is that despite his bogus claim and the bravado exhibited in the statements regarding the various technological issues, he virtually claimed not to be aware of anything at the end of everything”. On the alleged US forfeiture proceedings, Olanipekun argued that the witnesses of the petitioners failed to point to a single mention of the word “fine” in any of the documents forming part of the proceedings tendered as exhibits, which they admitted had not been registered in Nigeria in line with the clear provisions of section 3 of the Reciprocal Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Ordinance and Foreign Judgment (Reciprocal Enforcement) Act.

“Without prejudice to the foregoing, it is our submission that there is no admissible evidence before this court that will make it void or set aside the election of the 2nd respondent. May we submit straightaway that the petitioners have not produced any evidence before this court to warrant voiding or setting aside the respondent’s election.

“While the petitioners called 27 witnesses, it is our submission that substantially, the cumulative effect of the terse evidence produced by them is against the petitioners. We further draw the attention of the court to the fact that most of the witnesses came to rehash the evidence of others before them. In essence, the end result of their evidence is the alleged non-transmission of already collated and entered results on form EC8A, to IREV portal. “We adopt our arguments under issue 1, insofar as they relate to the evidence of witnesses and are appropriate for this issue. While we have already raised and argued preliminary objections to the petition itself, it is our further submission that every criminal allegation contained in the petition has not been proved, assuming without conceding that petitioners have not abandoned them.

“Starting from PW1, Captain Joe Agada (Rtd.) through to PW27, each of them admitted the correctness of the polling unit results. The law is trite that polling unit results constitute the foundation of an election. “A successful challenge to the accuracy of a polling unit result is a condition precedent to the challenge of transmission of such result, whether to the ward level, Local Government level, State level or national level, whether manually or electronically. Right from the old case of Nwobodo v. Onoh (1984) 15 NSCC 1 at 23, the Supreme Court has held that election issues end at the polling booths where results are recorded in FEDECO forms (now form EC8A), and that even if any issue arises, those forms and the results therein can be added. In the words of the Supreme Court:“Polling stations are the concrete foundation on which the pyramid of an election process is built.” “Both the law and statute on this position have not changed, whether with the introduction of BVAS or transmission to IREV. With much respect to the petitioners, one would have expected them to have a rethink on proceeding further with this petition after the delivery of the decision of the Supreme Court in Oyetola v. Adeleke (supra), a decision which covers the field and clinically considers all issues which the petitioners are now agitating before this Honourable Court, including their failure, not only to tender, but identify or attempt to examine through any of their ‘experts’, or witnesses any of the BVAS machines deployed by INEC in the course of the election. “In the same judgment, the Supreme Court stated that the use of the Voters’ Register has not been discarded under the new dispensation. In this connection, most of the witnesses called by the petitioners and, indeed, all the POS testified to the proper, seamless and effective use of the voters’ registers as well as the BVAS machines”. 

Tinubu then subsequently urged the PEPT to add the total of 10,929 votes in Kano State, belonging to him but were discounted during the process of collation, stating that if that was done it would increase his votes from 8,794,726 to 8,800,369.

“In paragraph 83 of the respondent’s reply, it has been pleaded that the votes scored by him in Kano State was discounted by 10,929; Exhibits RA20 and RA21 were tendered before this court and the sole witness called by the respondents was made to speak to them, identifying the figures relevant to the pleading as appearing in column 9 of each of the exhibits, that is, the votes recorded in RA20(Form EC8D) was discounted by 10,929 in Exhibit RA21 (Form EC8D(A). It was a mere arithmetical error which is apparent on the two exhibits. “Thus, the court has the power and jurisdiction to add the discounted figure of 10,929 to the final votes of 8,794,726, recorded for the respondent, to make his votes come to a total of 8,800,369, in conformity with Exhibits RA20 and RA21. We urge the court to so hold”, he said.

Meanwhile, the PEPT, Friday, reserved judgement on the Petition brought before it by APM challenging the outcome of the 2023 Elections.

Counsel to the Petitioner tendered and adopted their final written addresses and reports by all the parties and urged the Court to grant their Petition.

Hearing the Respondents, Counsel to the Respondents filed their various processes, final written addresses and point of law in the Petitioner’s final address. While also urging the Court to adopt their processes and dismiss the petition because it is frivolous and dead on arrival

Counsel to the Petitioner urged the Court to rely and adopt all their addresses and allow the petition by granting all the reliefs sort as the petition is meritorious.

Chairman of the panel, Justice Tsammani after hearing all parties, reserved judgement on the petition until a later date.

The APM is among the three parties challenging the declaration of Tinubu by INEC as president-elect on Marcyh 1, however, while its case relied mostly on the Supreme Court ruling which had, in the course of its petition before the PEPT, cleared Kashim Shettima of rhe double nomination allegation, the party told the court it was waiting for the judgement ruling to determine its next line of action.

The APM’s sole prayers in its petition was the illegal nomination of Shettima s APC vice presidential candidate.