Alright, we are up as the judges are now seated.
Justice Bolaji: Good afternoon to the bar, and everyone present in the court. You’re welcome to the afternoon session of the court.
Justice Tsammani: Appearances
Peter Obi is now up on his feet.
Peter Obi: Respectfully my lord, I am Mr. Peter Gregory Obi represents the petitioners.
APC: My lord, Saturday Monsiegne representing the 4th respondent, I am the Deputy Director Legal Services, APC
Lead Counsels:
Labour Party: SAN Livy
INEC: SAN Pinhero
Tinubu and Shettima: SAN Onipekun
APC: SAN Fagbemi
SAN Livy: My lord, we would continue from today to render the 11 LGA form EV8Bs from Ebonyi State.
Labour Party has now submitted the form EC8Bs of Ebonyi State.
It was noted that there are 12 bundles.
Labour Party: My lord, we would tender 12 LGA of Ebonyi State then.
INEC: My lord, we are objecting to the admissibility of these documents, and we would give our response in a full address.
Tinubu and Shettima: My lord, we oppose the documents rendered by the petitioners and would state our reasons in the final address.
APC: With due respect, my lord, we object to these documents, and we would give our reasons to the objection in a final address.
Justice Tsammani: The 12 bundles of form EC8Bs of Ebonyi State marked as EA1 – EA12 are hereby admitted as evidence.
The justices are now whispering with each other.
Justice Tsammani: Learned counsel. Please give us 2 minutes to go and write something.
The whole courtroom: As the court wishes my lord.
Alright, the judges are back
SAN Onipekun: My lord, I introduced my colleague as a chief.
Justice Ugo: Is he a Chief or a Prof
SAN Onipekun: It’s like a Mallam that is in a higher position.
Justice Tsammani: I don’t believe Mallam is higher than Sheihk, mallam is a half, and shiehk is from the source.
There are many Mallams.
SAN Ananaba LP: My lord, please, I may move on.
We have 4 LGA of Kaduna for forms EC8Bs to tender.
Justice Tsammani: EC8Cs or EC8Bs
SAN Ananaba: EC8Bs, my lord.
Justice Tsammani: Go on
SAN Ananaba has now tendered the form EC8Bs
INEC: We object to these documents and would state our reasons in a final address.
Tinubu and Shettima: We object to the documents presented by the petitioners and would give our reasons in full in the final address.
APC: We object to the admissibility of the documents and would state our reasons in a final address.
Justice Tsammani: You tendered Kaduna North and South yesterday, so why mention them again today.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we are giving supplementary documents just in case the wards are not complete.
Justice Tsammani: We have already marked those places tendered. You want to scatter our schedule.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we just want to add them, Sir, in case it’s not complete.
Justice Adah: So since we have them already, how are we going to document this again.
SAN Ananaba: My lords are the masters of this. Sir, we plead to add them as additional or supplementary documents
‘The justices are now talking with each other and flipping documents.
Justice Ugo is looking through some files while Justice Adah, Justice Tsammani and Justice Bello are talking seriously.
Justice Tsammani and Justice Bolaji are seriously gesticulating while talking with smiles on their face’.
Justice Tsammani: You want to disrupt the schedules and notes we have.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, it is not our fault,
we just received these documents from INEC, and we seek to tender it.
It’s not as if we had them, and we did not tender it.
INEC just provided them 2 days ago, my lord.
‘The justices are currently flipping pages upon pages.
Justice Bolaji, the only female judge on the case, just passed a document to justice Tsammani while pointing at something.
Justice Bello and justice Adah are actively flipping their pages to the hearing of the court.
Justice Tsammani: 4 LGA form EC8Bs of Kaduna State tendered are now admitted to the court as evidence and tagged as exhibits.
The Labour Party lawyers have a huge smile on their faces.
SAN Ananaba: Thank you, my lord.
My lord may I move to tender 4 LGA form EC8Bs of Oyo State.
‘Me in my mind I’m like Ah, but Oyo was also tendered yesterday’
The judges all have a weird look on their faces
The way Justice Tsammani looked at SAN Ananaba.
Justice Tsammani: The same Oyo State that was done yesterday.
SAN Ananaba: It’s not my fault, my lord.
Justice Tsammani: Go ahead.
SAN Ananaba has now tendered 4 additional LGA of Oyo State form EC8Bs
All the respondents including INEC has objected to the form EC8Bs being tendered by Labour Party, and they all stated they would give their reasons in a final address.
Justice Tsammani: Forms EC8Bs of 4 LGA in Oyo State tendered as evidence and tagged exhibits.
SAN Ananaba with a cheeky smile on his face: My lord, 1 LGA for Nasarawa is left, and it’s on page 60 of the 4th schedule for the LGA called Kiana.
Justice Tsammani: When was Nasarawa tendered.
SAN Ananaba: On Monday, my lord.
After flipping through some pages, Justice Tsammani: Nasarawa was not tendered
SAN Ananaba: It was my lord. It’s just one LGA left.
The secretary is now up to help the judges get the documents for Nasarawa.
SAN Ananaba: We have tendered Nasarawa, my lord.
Justice Tsammani: Okay, I’ve seen it. Go ahead.
SAN Ananaba: Thank you, my lord.
As usual, all the respondents, including INEC, have now objected to the admissibility of the Nassarawa LGA form EC8Bs.
Justice Tsammani: The document of form EC8Bs are now tendered and admitted
APC lawyer interrupts
APC: My lord, you didn’t take down my objection. I was waiting for you to finish writing before I speak.
Justice Ugo: There’s no problem we recorded the usual thing for you
‘Everyone is laughing’
Justice Ugo: Or you want to accept.
Justice Tsammani: There’s no need. We have recorded. We know what you want to say. It’s your usual statement.
Justice Tsammani: The document of form EC8Bs are now tendered and admitted to the court.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, you heard what he said that he did not give his objection
Justice Tsammani: It’s okay, it’s okay, we heard him. Let’s go on.
Justice Tsammani quickly stopped LP SAN Ananaba before he started a gbas gbos.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we have 8 LGA of Bayelsa State form EC8Cs
All respondents (INEC, APC, Tinubu, and Shettima) have objected to the tendering of these documents as evidence before the court and stated they would give a reason at the final address
Justice Tsammani: Documents of Form EC8Cs of 8 LGA of Bayelsa State are now tendered and tagged as exhibits.
SAN Ananaba: We now wish to tender my lord 23 LGA form EC8Cs of Benue state on page 79 of the 4th schedule.
Justice Tsammani gives a nod in affirmation.
All respondents have now objected to the document tendered.
Justice Tsammani has now documented them as evidence before the court.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, to quickly tender 18 LGA in Cross River State on page 80 of the 4th schedule
Justice Tsammani: Let’s go on
All the respondents, as usual, objected to the documents presented by the Labour Party and Peter Obi lawyers.
Justice Tsammani has now admitted the form EC8Cs as evidence before the court as exhibit PAT1 – PAT18
*JUST A REMINDER*
Form EC8A is the pink slip at the polling unit level where every polling agent sign the result. It is the first point of collating votes.
The EC8B is the form used at the Ward where they compile all the form EC8A above and input the number of votes from there into the EC8B. It is the Ward computation form.
The EC8C is used at LGA to compute total of votes per wards.
The form EC8D is for the state. So they compute all the LGA votes and record it here.
The EC8E is what is used for concluded signatory results.
This is what is used to declare the winner.
It is the final sheet for declaring the winner of the election.
The lawyers would have to tender as evidence all the documents that INEC “claimed” to have used to declare their winner.
So that when the gbas gbos of cross examination starts, everyone can see for themselves clearly that INEC didn’t just steal but disregarded the entire democratic process.
So let the lawyers take their time to submit these documents, so that even if it’s for all of us to carry calculator in the courtroom and start counting it ourselves, we would find out where INEC got their false figures from.
So, hopefully, Labour Party would be able to round this up today.
So far, the record from our lawyers shows we have tendered the following form EC8Cs:
12 LGA in Ebonyi were tendered
18 LGA form EC8Cs in Edo State
20 LGA form EC8Cs in Lagos State
25 LGA form EC8Cs in Niger State
18 LGA in Ondo State
33 LGA in Oyo State
23 LGA in Rivers State
23 LGA in Sokoto State
These were all rendered, and all respondents objected to the admissibility of the evidence and stated their reasons would be given in their final address.
Justice Tsammani admitted all these forms EC8Cs as evidence before the court and tagged them as exhibits.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, may I call the next documents. Move to schedule 5, my lord.
Justice Tsammani: What about Kaduna that I can see on this schedule.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we are not presenting Kaduna today.
Justice Tsammani: Okay
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we would tender 23 LGAs of form EC8Cs in Ekiti State today.
INEC: My lord, may I hand over to my respectable colleague Wendy Kuku
It’s like INEC is tired
Wendy with a Cinderella voice: My lord, we object to the documents tendered by the petitioners and we would profoeerrrr (that’s how she said it oh, the phonetics is from heaven) and we would profoeerrrr our reasons in a final written address.
Tinubu and Shettima: My lord, we oppose these documents, and we would state our reasons in a final address.
Justice Tsammani already started moving on to admit the documents
APC lawyer is on his feet
APC: My lord, I have not stated my objection.
Justice Tsammani: Don’t worry, Kazeem, we know what you want to say.
Justice Ugo: We have helped you write it already. Don’t worry.
‘Of course, he wanted to say, we OBJECT to the documents tendered by the petitioners.’
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we would tender the form EC8Cs for 25 LGA in Delta State.
Justice Tsammani: Go ahead
All respondents have objected to these documents being tendered by SAN Ananaba for Labour Party and Peter Obi and have stated that they would state their reasons at the final stage.
Even INEC fine lawyer Wendy objected.
Justice Tsammani: These documents of forms EC8Cs are now admitted as evidence before the court and tagged as exhibits.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, let us accommodate my request to move back to the 4th schedule to tender the form EC8Ds
Justice Tsammani: Page what
SAN Ananaba: Page 76, my lord, I wish to tender the form EC8Ds of the 36 States AND the FCT, My lord AND the FCT.
SAN Ananaba is shaking tables. Why is he shouting AND FCT like that
The justices are all laughing.
SAN Ananaba has now tendered the form EC8Ds
All the respondents have objected to the admissibility of these documents in court.
Justice Tsammani: The form EC8Ds for Katsina State is 2 here but you wrote 4
SAN Ananaba: My lord it is 2
Justice Tsammani: So you will bring the remaining 2
SAN Ananaba: No my lord. It’s just 2 there’s no other one
Justice Tsammani: Document of form EC8Ds of the 36 states of the federation and the FCT have now been tendered to the court as evidence and admitted as PDE1 to PDE37.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, we would now tender the National Results of the 36 States and the FCT, and I’m sure nobody would object to this one.
It’s just one document, and it’s a national document.
INEC, for the first time ever, did not object.
INEC: My lord, the 1st respondent do not object and we give our consent.
Tinubu and Shettima: My lord, we object
The whole courtroom is laughing.
A lawyer at the back: You’re objecting to the document that announced the person you’re defending.
Tinubu lawyer: Oh my lord, no, I don’t object.
I was not paying attention and was looking at a document.
I have no objection. I do not object, my lord.
Justice Tsammani: When you’re already used to saying objection.
APC: I don’t object, my lord. We give consent to this document
Justice Tsammani: Documents of form EC8E tendered to the court has now been admitted and tagged as exhibits.
SAN Ananaba: My lord, let’s go on because I want to tender forms EC40G
The whole courtroom is murmuring.
APC: Ahn Ahn, are you not tired?
Justice Tsammani: Please, we are tired. Oh
Have pity on Kalu
SAN Ananaba: Kalu just celebrated his 70th on Saturday, he’s now on the 7th floor, but he’s not tired.
Justice Tsammani: Me I’m on the 6th floor, and I’m already tired. I am sure he’s tired since he’s on his 7th floor. See Pinhero too is tired Pity us
SAN Ananaba: Please, we don’t have time let’s continue
Justice Tsammani: We have been here since 9am, you just came this afternoon.
Please let’s adjourn.
SAN Ananaba: Okay, my lord, as you wish.
Labour Party Lawyers are not tired, oh
They want to close the court by 4 am….lolll
SAN Ananaba: Okay, my lord, we would move to adjourn
Justice Tsammani: Don’t worry, nobody will object to adjournment.
So justice, Tsammani, has now adjourned the case to tomorrow, 8th June 2023, by 2pm.