Time: 9:30am
Mr Peter Obi is in court live
Labour Party legal counsel team have arrived as well
The Justices are here.
Lead Justice, Hon. Justice Tsammani welcomes everyone and the case is called CA/PEPC/03/2023.
Time: 9:44am
PARTIES
– Peter Obi represents the Petitioners.
– Saturday Monsigna represents 4th Respondent
Counsels:
PETITIONERS LEGAL TEAM
LEAD: DR LIVY UZOUKWU SAN
– Awa Kalu SAN
– PIN Ikwueto SAN
– Ben Anechebe SAN
– Ikechukwu Ezechukwu SAN
– Valerie Azinge SAN
– Emeka Opoko SAN
– Alex Ejesieme SAN
– Peter Afuba SAN
– Audu Anuga SAN
– Rita Garba Esq
– Olusola Esq
– Emelia Esq
1ST RESPONDENTS LEGAL TEAM (INEC)
LEAD: AB MAHMOUD SAN
– Essien
– Stephen SAN
– TM Inuwa SAN
– Suleiman Ibrahim SAN
– Nasara Auta Esq
– Patricia Obi Esq
– Wendy Kuku Esq
2ND & 3RD RESPONDENTS LEGAL TEAM (TINUBU/SHETTIMA)
LEAD: CHIEF AKIN OLUJIMI SAN
– Prof. Taiwo Osipitan SAN
– Adebayo SAN
– Dr. Hassan Liman SAN
– Chief Onoja SAN
– Olatunde Busari SAN
– AU Mustapha SAN
– Mutalib Ojo SAN
– Dr Tunji Abayomi Esq
– Ibrahim Audu Esq
– Akintola Makinde Esq
4TH RESPONDENT (APC):
LEAD: LO FAGBEMI SAN
– Charles Edosowan SAN
– Afolabi Fashanu SAN
– Abiodun Owonikoko SAN
– Dakas Dakas SAN
– Suraj SAN
– Gboyega Oyewole SAN
– Tajudeen Oladoja SAN
– Mumini Hanafi SAN
– Saheed Sanusi SAN
– Omosanya Popoola Esq
– O. Akintola Esq
– Oyedele Esq
Time: 9:44am
The battle now begins!
Dr. Livy for LP informs the court that they will continue from yesterday and make PW4 available for Cross-examination by the respondents.
He defers to Ikwueto SAN to conduct the proceedings for the Petitioners.
Time: 10:8am
The witness, Prof. Eric is reminded that he is still on oath
1st Respondent Cross-examination:
Q. Where were you on election Day?
A. I went to vote
Q. You voted and it went on smoothly?
A. Yes
Q. You were commissioned to produce this report by the LP?
A. I was requested to produce the repo.
Q. You were paid for it?
A. Nobody paid me
Q. You acted as a patriotic Nigerian?
A. I’m a patriotic Nigerian, yes.
Q. As a disinterested party?
A. Yes
Q. Going by the terms of reference mentioned in Para3 of your WSO, primary source of data was the IREV Portal.
A. Yes
Q. In your witness statement, you made reference to Forms EC8As as well as results uploaded on the IREV Portal, I assume you were referring to the same thing?
A. Not exactly
Q. What did you mean?
A. It’s because they are different
Q. What’s the difference?
A. Forms EC8A is different
A. From what’s uploaded
Q. The Form EC8A uploaded on the portal is the only document you could see on the portal?
A. Not really
Court: what is not really?that’s not a definite answer
A. His questions did not require a definite Answer
Question is repeated
A. No
Q. What else can you see
A. There were blurred images and some that were not related to the analysis done. For instance, results of Senate replaced for House of Reps.
Q. When you refer to Blurred images of Forms EC8A, you did not mean the physical copies could be blurred?
A. I didn’t see physical copies
Q. In all your review, you did not see anything on the portal that suggests there is an electronic collation system?
A. The IREV portal is an electronic collation system
Q. Are you suggesting to the court that the portal is capable of collating
AB: are you suggesting that the portal is capable of collating and tabulating the election by result?
W: it is not capable of doing that
AB: in your wsoo you made reference to 18,000 polling unit with blurred result then you used LP agents results (pg 8) In appendix E
W: Yes
Q. And tabulating the results
A. It’s not capable of doing that
Q. In Appendix E, you made reference to Labour Party agent Forms EC8As
A. Yes
Q. Did you attach them to your report?
A. It has been tendered to the court. I did not
Q. You’re not an election expert
A. It depends
Time: 10:18am
Q. I suggest to you that there was no way you undertook the task in Para3(c) of your Witness Statement, not being an expert.
A. If I understand you clearly, the electoral act and guidelines for conduct of election requires online..
Q. Just answer the question. Are you an election expert, can you determine compliance?
A. I can determine compliance
Q. Look at Exhibit PCB1 series, for Rivers State. (He’s shown the report he tendered that was marked as Exhibit) What LGA is that?
(The court officials are trying to get the document in question which have been marked, looks like they didn’t bring it into the courtroom earlier)
Q. Confirm to the court when you concluded your assignment
A. 19th of March
Q. Back to Exhibit PCB2. Can you read out to LGA
A. Degema
Q. In Ward 7, the Polling Unit you see is?
A. 002
Q. Accredited Voters is 40 correct?
A. Yes
Q. Number of voters 40 correct?
A. Yes
Q. No over voting correct?
A. No over voting
AB Mahmoud: thank you very much Professor, thank you my Lords
2ND AND 3RD RESPONDENTS CROSS-EXAMINATION (Tinubu/Shettima)
Q. You’ll agree with me that votes are cast at the polling unit?
A. I agree
Q. At end of election, the votes cast will be sorted, counted and recorded in Forms EC8As?
A. Yes
Q. It is the image of Form EC8A that will be transmitted to
Q. IREV but the hard copies will be taken by the presiding officer to the ward collation center?
A. Yes
Q. The statutory channel for computation of results of voting begins from the polling unit to ward, to LGA, to state a d to national collation centers?
A. Correct my Lord.
Time: 10:23sm
Q. It is part of your claim in your report that some forms you downloaded were blurred
A. Yes
Q. Will I be correct to say that whether transmission failed or what you downloaded was blurred, it will not change the result recorded at the Polling Unit.
A. It will not change if…
A. …Properly used
Q. You also will confirm that IREV is not a collation center
A. It’s not a collation center but meant to serve as a checker
Q. Your report covers only two states, Benue and Rivers State?
A. We did analysis of all the states
Time: 10:28am
Q. Your report is for 2 states?
A. Not only 2 states, Benue and Rivers are part of what I tendered.
Q. Did you tender for Oyo State?
A. Yes
Q. Apart from Rivers and Benue, which other state did you tender?
A. In what I tendered the two states stood out, Rivers and benue
Q. Prof, which other state did you tender?
A. You’re asking the question and smiling, I don’t know…
The whole court is laughing…
Court: Chief Olujimi, you better frown while asking 😀😀😀
Court: this is between senior Advocate of the law and senior Advocate of mathematics.
Time: 10:29am
Court: did you tender for any other state apart from benue and Rivers?
A. No
Q. In your report, you made it clear that you worked only on available data.
A. I worked only on available data but it is expected that the data should be completed.
Time: 10:32am
Q. If you had more data, your report will be different
A. Yes
Q. in your witness statement at paragraph 2B, page 2, you listed recent data analysis practical experience
A. Yes
Q. You’ve not claimed in this witness statement to have done any analysis for a court case in election
Q. Matter like this?
A. No
Q. At Paragraph 3, Page 2 of your witness statement, you said you were requested on 20th Feb. 2023 by Labour Party to carry out analysis on the results for election not yet held?
A. Yes
Q. You were also in that engagement required to determine INEC compliance with electoral act and regulations
A. Yes.
Time: 10:40am
Q. At same Paragraph 3 Sub B, part of your mandate was to determine whether the results to be announced by INEC match with result uploaded without any anticipation that LP will lose the election?
A. That’s part of what was requested of me to do
Q. I find it strange that after your engagement showing you specifically what you were told to do, you now insisted on subpoena
A. In that engagement, nobody made mention of coming to court so I didn’t anticipate coming to court.
This cross-examination is ended!
4TH RESPONDENT CROSS-EXAMINATION
Q. Prof. The report you’ve tendered was based on blurred result downloaded from INEC IREV portal
A. Not just blurred results
Q. The exercise you conducted on the blurred result, what aspect of mathematics did you apply?
A. There’s no theory in knowing that something is blurred
Q. I’ll be correct to say that your report based on that aspect of complain is not a product of any expertise?
A. Of course
Time: 10:42am
Q. Can you assist the honourable court, what level of numeral literacy do you suggest a person must posses to add results and collate it at different levels?
A. INEC does not require experts to do that
Q. To be able to do arithmetic, are you suggesting that?
A. youre correct, (any level of mathematical knowledge)
Q. Your choice of Rivers and benue, was it as a result of random pick not informed by any theory?
A. Random pick
Time: 10:47am
Q. You’re aware that at the last presidential election PDP, APC and LP all won a number of states in terms of majority of votes
A. My job have nothing to do with who win and who did not win
Q. Did you know?
A. What you heard may not be correct
Q. Confirm you did not hear anything about the evential outcome of the election.
A. I heard something
Q. Who won the election based on what INEC announced?
Q. Who won in benue state based on what INEC declared?
(Witness is dragging in answering the question)
Q. Do you now recall which party won in Rivers and benue?
A. I can’t say for now
Q. Those two states were won by APC is that correct?
A. I told you can’t say for now
Q. In your report, there’s an element of statistics involved
A. I dealt on exact data
Q. What you did was to sample and extrapolate
A. Sampling have to do with forecasting, I used exact data
Q. How many polling units are there in Rivers State?
A. I don’t have everything off-head
Q. How about benue state?
A. Same answer my Lord
Q. The total number of polling units in Rivers and benue does not amount to 18,000 blurred results you want the court to cancel
A. Since I do not know the number of polling unit, how do I know? They will not add up.
Time: 10:55am
Q. Admonition for statistics: Researchers should be aware of statistical error and sampling error arising from random sampling and bias.
A. I’m not a statistian. The data is an exact data, there’s no randomness in it.
Time: 11am
Q. So your choice of two states was not a random choice?
A. The data is an exact data but when it comes to selection of sample space, the selection is done randomly
Court: you said you did random sampling?
A. No, the choice of states is random but the sampling data is exact
Q. If you have opportunity to do research on other states, you’ll get different results?
A. Each state will come up with its own results
Q. In your report, you analyzed Forms EC8As on the IREV, nowhere did you allude to what was on EC8Bs and EC8Cs
A. Once it’s wrong at the polling unit level, it will be wrong up, so the most important form to analyze is Form EC8A
That’s all on the CROSS-EXAMINATION!
Time: 11:4am
There’s no questions in reexamination from the LP team. Ikwueto SAN for LP now asked that the witness be discharged.
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