The candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Mr Peter Obi Tuesday called his first witness to testify before the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) sitting in Abuja.
Obi is challenging the outcome of the presidential election held on February 25, alleging that it was rigged in favour of President Bola Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
The court at the sitting also admitted in evidence, the United States of America (USA) District Court judgment which allegedly indicted President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and ordered him to forfeit $460,000 in drug related offences.
During his cross-examination, the witness, Lawrence Nwakaeti, a lawyer who hails from Ihiala in Anambra state, told the court that he identified a document relating to a court proceeding in the United States of America indicting Tinubu in an alleged drug-related-case.
The witness, led in evidence by Mr Jibrin Okutepa, SAN, tendered the court’s judgment as part of requests by Obi and Labour Party to get Tinubu’s declaration as winner of the February 25, 2023 presidential election nullified and set aside.
Although the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), through its lead counsel, Mr. Abubakar Mahmood, SAN, did not oppose the admissibility of the document, both counsels to President Tinubu, Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN and the ruling All Progressives Congress, Prince Lateef Fagbemi, SAN objected, saying they were vehemently opposed to the admissibility of the document.
The two counsels however declined to comment on their reasons for opposing the document.
But at the proceedings, Justice Haruna Tsammani-led’s five-member panel admitted the document as evidence and marked it as Exhibit PA- 5.
While being cross-examined by INEC’s lawyer, the witness told the court that he was a registered voter that participated in the presidential election held on February 25.
He said: “I have my Permanent Voters Card and I voted at my polling unit located in front of my house at Umuezella Village Square.I did not play any other role except exercising my civic duty.”
The Presiding Justice of the Court, Justice Haruna Simon Tsammani, has shifted further hearing in the petition till today, May 31, 2023.
