Confusion In Nasarawa Tribunal As APC’s Star Witness Aliyu Bello Testifies In Favour Of PDP

Engr. Abdullahi Sule’a star witness who introduced himself as both the Nasarawa State APC Secretary and the state returning agent for APC in the March 18, 2023, gubernatorial election was faced with a great challenge during his cross-examination as he ended up building more hope for the petitioners.

After the most devastating outing by the first respondent (INEC) who opened and closed their defense on Friday 17th August 2023, without producing a single witness to give life to the documents they submitted, the Nasarawa state electorates were hopeful of a positive outing come Saturday 18th August 2023.

As the day began with much expectations as to what the Engr. Sule’s counsel will unleash to defend the many irregularities that surround Sule’s announcement by Prof. Ishaya Audu, Sule’s lead Counsel, Chief Rotimi Adeladu (SAN) began the day by seeking to tender some documents from the bar which includes:

1. 37 form EC8As of some affected polling

units

2. Forms EC8Bs of 33 Electoral wards of 7 Local Government Areas of the state.

3. Form EC8As of 29 polling units of some affected Areas which Gov Sule claims his votes were deducted by unknown forces

4. 3 Receipts of payments to the 1st Respondent (INEC) in respect of the CTC documents).

Although the 1st respondent INEC and 3rd responded APC accepted the documents that were tendered by the 2nd respondent, the PDP lead counsel represented by Jibril S. Okutepa (SAN) however after he clarified that he will not behave like the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd responded who objected to everything presented by the petitioner including the genuine INEC receipt that was issued from INEC office. Okutepa (SAN) accepted the receipts, but he however objected to the remaining documents citing their lack of substance and reserve his reasons till the final address.

After all submissions in the morning hours of the tribunal, the 2nd respondent lead counsel of Engr. Sule pleaded with the tribunal to grant him some hours of leave as he claimed that he was expecting one of his witnesses who is presently at Akwanga on his way to the tribunal. The request was granted by the tribunal and seating was adjourned till noon.

At resumption, the 2nd petitioner presented his first witness who was sworn under oath at about 1 pm. The witness introduced himself as both the Nasarawa State APC Secretary and the APC state returning agent for the March 18, 2023, gubernatorial election. By name Aliyu Bello.

Aliyu who at first established his presence with much confidence during his cross-examination by the 1st and 3rd respondents, later lost confidence when the cross-examination by the PDP lead counsel J.S Okutepa (SAN) began. After clarifying the legibility of the witness to testify as an APC agent, the PDP lead counsel began by cross-examining the witness to ascertain how knowledgeable is he about the election processes and the processes involved in transmitting elections, at what point is election supposed to be declared canceled and what was the reason behind the cancellation of results in Ashige Ward among others.

Responding, Aliyu the APC star witness said that he is not aware of the existence of form ECGPU40, the same form INEC tendered on Friday 17th August 2023 to support their declaration of Gov A A Sule.

Aliyu further agreed that elections are only won in the polling units base on Form

EC8A results which are the bases and foundation for any election build-up; he said that election results are transferred from form EC8A to EC8B and EC8C in that manner. Also, Aliyu agreed that INEC BVAS IREV is the only source where results can be properly confirmed as results transmitted manually can be tempered with during manual transfers.

Although Aliyu insisted that APC votes were reduced in so many polling units by INEC,

He claimed that most of the APC results were wrongly calculated and disputed into the INEC forms. Also, Aliyu established that BVAS was not used in any of these areas under contention.

Although there is no evidence or petition filed by APC or Engr. Sule is against the INEC but it appears Aliyu is having a fight with INEC over his claim for irregularity, a question which the PDP lead counsel asked if Aliyu has some problem with INEC which he confirm. Yes, because of his affected votes as claimed. This also contradicts his claim of victory for Sule as declared by Prof. Ishaya Audu the INEC returning officer.

Aliyu also confessed to the tribunal that elections can only be canceled in the polling units where elections were conducted and not at the Ward or LG level as done by the electoral commission during the conduct of the March 18th elections in Ashige and other wards under contention. He contradicted his statement by saying elections were canceled in Ashige ward due to violence contrary to his claim in his statement under oath that elections were canceled due to over-voting.

Aliyu the APC returning agent also did a blunder by denying that Bar. Ayiwulu the PDP agent was not present at the state collation center, while during his cross-examination by the PDP lead counsel, Aliyu explained that Bar. Ayiwulu was raising unnecessary objections during the collations at the state collation center.

Another twist came at the point when the star witness lose his cool at the point when the PDP lead counsel became concerned about the nature of answers issued by the witness because it appear the witness was rather testifying in favour of PDP. The PDP lead counsel J.S Okutepa asked the witness what was his level of education. The question didn’t go down well with Aliyu who responded in anger but was cautioned by the tribunal to respond to questions without attaching emotions. The witness reluctantly answered the question by saying SSCE is his highest qualification.

Haven heard this confession which speaks more in favour of the PDP, the 1st 2nd, and 3rd respondents began to object to the many errors that were already established by their witness, and they began to interrupt the smooth flow of cross-examination by assuming the position of timekeepers. PDP lead counsel who was on his cross-examination was forced to end due to interjections.

Recall that PDP is challenging the declaration of Audu Alhaji Sule in the 18th March 2023 gubernatorial elections due to some major irregularities surrounded by inflating of votes in Chiroma, Gayam, and other wards under contention, while cancellation of votes in Ashige ward among others. This if corrected will amount to the declaration of a new governor for Nasarawa state in person of Hon. David Emmanuel Onbugadu of the PDP.

The sitting was adjourned to Thursday 24th, Friday 25th, and Saturday 26th, August 2023 for further hearing.