The Labour Party and its candidate, Mr. Peter Obi on Saturday played a video as evidence before the court where the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) assured Nigerians in a broadcast that the results would be transmitted in real-time to the I-rev portal.
The tribunal began Saurday’s sitting by dismissing an application filed by the LP seeking to interrogate the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on the technology deployed for the conduct of the election.
In two applications, the petitioners had through Patrick Ikweto, their counsel, prayed the court to order INEC to supply the names and other details of its ICT professionals.
In a unanimous decision, the tribunal ruled that the applicants failed to disclose any extreme circumstance that stopped them from filing within the statutory time.
The five-member panel led by Haruna Tsammani said the tribunal lacked the jurisdiction to grant the request because it was made outside the pre-hearing session.
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After the back and forth of Friday, Peter Obi and the LP eventually played two video clips during Saturday’s proceedings.
In the process of playing the first clip, a glitch was encountered but it was quickly resolved.
The videos contained interviews with Mahmood Yakubu, INEC chairman, and Festus Okoye, a national commissioner, giving assurances on the functionality of the bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS) in the 2023 elections.
After playing the video evidence before the court, the LP sought to tender Form EC40G for eight LGAs in Benue state.
The five-member panel of the tribunal admitted the documents as exhibits.
Lawyers of the respondents — INEC, President Bola Tinubu, Vice-President Kashim Shettima, and the All Progressives Congress (APC) — objected to the admissibility of the documents and said they would reserve their objections until the final address.