The All Progressives Congress (APC) 2023 senatorial candidate of Benue South, Comrade Daniel Onjeh, has petitioned the Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) Chairman, Prof. Mahmud Yakubu, over what he termed concealment of sensitive electoral materials used for the February 25 poll in Benue South by some staff of INEC.
In a three-page petition to the INEC chairman dated May 22, Onjeh stated the Hon. Justice Ory Zik-Ikeorha-led National/State Legislative House Election Tribunal holding in Makurdi, Benue State, had in its ruling on his ex parte motion challenging the outcome of the election granted an order permitting him, his lawyers and agents to conduct physical inspection and take photocopies of all the sensitive electoral materials used by INEC for the conduct of the election.
Onjeh, who was APC’s candidate in the 2015 re-run election against former Senate President, David Mark, further wrote that when his team got to the INEC Local Government Offices at Oju, Obi, Otukpo, Agatu, Apa, Okpokwu, Ado and Ohimini Local Government Areas of Benue South, they realised for majority of the polling units which they were challenging the results in court, the ballot papers were not provided for inspection because they were not available.
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The former President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) and the West Africa Students’ Union (WASU) added that they were shocked to observe that the ballot papers for the conduct of the election across the local governments they had visited for inspection were either not available or all muddled up.
He said because there were no Polling Unit Code Numbers on the ballot papers, they could not establish which ballot paper was used in any particular Polling Unit.
“The findings from our inspection of the ballot papers are expected to avail us of sufficient evidence to present in court in defense of our claims of votes suppression and reallocation, unauthorized mutilations of election result sheets, non accreditation of Voters, amongst others; following which we may pray the Tribunal to order a recount of the ballot papers, or the Tribunal may suo motu order a recount of the ballot papers in the court, when the trial of the case commences formally on 3rd June, 2023,” Onjeh stated.
Onjeh argued since they claimed his opponent in the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Sen. Patrick Abba Moro, won the election, the original ballot papers used for the conduct of the election should not be produced in the open court.
Onjeh further alleged that since the Tribunal had scheduled June 3, 2023 for sitting to commence the trial proper on his petition, which gives him barely eight days to close his case, it was clear from all that was playing out that INEC could be sabotaging his case because he needed to promptly conclude the inspection of the electoral materials to write his report and submit to the Tribunal to pave way for the recounting of the ballot papers in court.
Onjeh, who was the immediate past Chairman of the Governing Board of Projects Development Institute (PRODA), Enugu, requested the INEC Chairman to direct the relevant INEC officials at the various Local Government Offices in Benue South to promptly reorganise all the ballot papers and other sensitive materials and to allow him and his team to have unfettered access to inspect them in line with the Order of the Tribunal.
“Permit me to further state that the inspection of the sensitive electoral materials by me and my team must entail flipping through the various electoral materials, including ballot papers, to check for incidences of irregularities.
‘’It is not enough for INEC to enable us to only stare at the materials from a distance. We must be allowed to get close enough in order to establish the evidences that we are seeking to present to the court,” added Onjeh in the petition.