Kwande Sets To Prove Overvoting -PW5 Rabiu Lawal Testifies On Plateau North Senatorial Seat

Yakubu Busari

The Chairman of the Peoples Redemption Party, (PRP) Hon. Rabiu Lawal has testified before the national election tribunal held on the 25th day of February 2023 in the Plateau Northern Senatorial District of six (6) local government councils of Plateau State.

Rabiu Lawal whose statement on oaths was front-loaded on page 40 of the witness dated 19/03/2023 told the tribunal that he is a businessman who is into buying and selling and a resident of Jos North LGA where he identified the petitioner’s statement through his own signature.

He adopted his statement on oaths as part of oral evidence before the tribunal and the 1st,2^nd, and 3rd respondents couldn’t object to the admissibility of the petitioner’s fresh list of documents.

Rabiu Lawal, who is the star witness, and the counsel for the petitioners, Yakubu H Ruba applied to tender additional documents which were marked as exhibits 184-186 that reference on page 11.

While on cross-examination, Rabiu Lawal told the tribunal that he voted on the day of the election and went through an accreditation proper, and his name was ticked from the BVAS machine.

He confirmed to the tribunal that he is not an agent, but an opposition, they’re challenging the ad hoc delegate selection that produced Hon. Musa Avia Agah’s victory legality as the 2nd respondent.

When, the 1st respondent’s counsel, Barr. Salisu Aliyu and S.S.Usman  sought to know whether Rabiu is a card-carrying member of the PDP, he said no my lord, but are aware that the 3rd respondent PDP conducted congress on April 2022, he said, No. And I know the process that produced the 2nd respondent, Lawal said.

The respondent Aliyu requested that paragraph 22 of the witness statement on oaths be shown to him, which is the list of 174 polling units, but during the cross-examination, he said there was no numbering of rejected votes listed in the schedule.

However, the second documentary evidence presented by the witness statement was the exhibits P183-P185 their judgment delivered in 2022.

The 2nd respondent, Simon Mwadkon, counsel Pius Akubo , SAN, asked Rabiu Lawal whether he still stands by his statement deposed on oaths, he confirmed that yes, and Akubo requested whether Rabiu Lawal personally applied for CTC but the answer was not it was his counsel.

Akubo demanded that the witness statement depose are misleading to the fact of the tribunal, but he rather says, “no, adding I’m not a candidate of my party PRP and also showed paragraphs 10 and 13 statements which bordered on PDP structure in Plateau State and the nomination and sponsorship. Rabiu explains that the witness statement on oaths was sent in error by the petitioner’s counsel and they were unable to effect correction.

According to Rabiu Lawal, I read some parts of the petition, but he emphasized more on the overvoting and irregularities in 178 polling units and that was not captured in the statement 43 to 53 including pages 12 to 21 of the petitioners.

Led in evidence, Rabiu adopted his witness statement and was cross-examined by other respondents.

Responding to questions from Akubo , S.S.Usman,,M.Y. Tanko and J.M.Okafor counsel to respondents  the witness said images captured on bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS) machines required data services for them to be uploaded to the INEC result viewing portal (IREV) and the said documents are with INEC

However, he added that whether or not photographic copies of polling unit results captured by BVAS are transmitted manually or electronically, the integrity of the election was not compromised.

The witness admitted that the election was marred by irregularities, but while on docked said it was not “free, fair and in substantial compliance with the electoral act”.

Under cross-examination, he said the glitch on the IREV portal on the day of the election did not affect the actual scores of the candidates as the results of each of them remained the same.

He said INEC did not do an electronic collation of results during the senatorial election.

The petitioners set to close their case in July by calling at least a few witnesses.