Governor Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa state has closed his case in the petition filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate, David Umbugadu, in the proceedings that run up to 6pm on Saturday.
According to The Nation, Umbugadu filed a petition challenging the validity of the governorship election conducted on Saturday, March 18, that declared Abdullahi Sule the winner of the election, before the governorship Election Petition Tribunal in Lafia.
However, Governor Sule’s legal team, headed by Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Wole Olanikpekun, countered the PDP petition by calling 21 witnesses that testified in support of Governor Sule that the March 18th Governorship election was free and fair.
Nearly all of the 21 witnesses testified before the tribunal that the PDP undervalued the votes cast for Governor Sule of the APC in the various voting units and wards around the state, claiming that the PDP actually conspired to seize power through the backdoor by using fake votes.
The Nation report that, Governor Sule requested to have his defence closed at the tribunal’s Saturday continuation of proceedings after presenting an additional seven witnesses in addition to the seven who had already testified under oath about widespread non-collation of legitimate APC votes during the governorship election.
The Nasarawa, Kokona, Wamba, and Toto Local Government Area witnesses attested to the fact that Abdullahi Sule and the APC were underserved due to improper vote counting at several ward and local government collation sites.
Adamu Ibrahim Otto, who is from the Nasarawa Local Government Area, testified before the tribunal that the election in his Odu/Kadu electoral ward, RW46, was calm and that INEC workers used the BVAS machine to authenticate voters. Otto also confirmed that after using Code 018 to cast his ballot at Apaku Polling Unit, the Presiding Officer uploaded a scanned copy of the results to the IREV.
His main issue, he claimed, was that when the results were entered on Form EC8B, the vote for his political party, the APC, was decreased while the vote for the PDP grew.
The witness attested that there were three voting units in the Kana/Onda/Apawu ward registration area of the Nasarawa Local Government Area where the APC was shortchanged: Apaku with voting Unit Code 018, RW26, Andrew Wayo with Polling Unit Code 010, RW27, and Odu/Kadu with Polling Unit Code 005, RW28.
Otto claimed that the APC received 101 votes and the PDP 14, while the Kana/Onda/Apawu ward collation centre findings showed that the APC received 72 votes and the PDP received 44.
Lukundu (
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