Only presidential poll results failed to upload on IREV, INEC presiding officers tell court

Three witnesses who served as presiding officers for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) during the February 25 polls say only the results of the presidential poll failed to upload into the commission’s result viewing portal (IREV).

The witnesses on Monday, appeared before the presidential election petition tribunal in Abuja.

Led in evidence by Eyitayo Jegede, counsel to the petitioners, Janet Turaki, who served as a presiding officer in Damaturu, Yobe state, said voter registration was seamless.

She said all other processes went well until it was time for the results transmission.

Turaki said the results of the senate and house of representatives polls were transmitted successfully but that of the presidential election could not be transmitted.

Turaki told the court that despite following the online and offline transmission methods as she was trained to do, the presidential election results failed to upload.

Turaki added that she and other party agents present at the polling unit signed the results on the form EC8A before it was taken to the ward.

The witness added that she filled out the complaint form provided by INEC for such purposes when the results did not load on the IREV portal.

Two other witnesses, Christopher Ardo and Victoria Sani who served as INEC presiding officers at Bauchi and Katsina states also said they were unable to transmit presidential election results into the IREV.

All three witnesses were subpoenaed by the court through a joint application of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.

Under cross-examination, the witnesses agreed that transmission failure was due to network glitches, adding that they did not know if the results were eventually transmitted.

Atiku and his party are contesting the victory of Bola Tinubu as Nigeria’s president.

The PDP standard-bearer is accusing Tinubu of not disclosing facts of his constitutional qualifications in his Form EC9 submitted to the INEC.

He further averred that Tinubu is unfit to govern the country having been indicted for drug-related offences in the United States and was made to forfeit a sum of $460,000 as a compromise agreement.

Atiku said Tinubu failed to secure 25 percent of the votes cast in the federal capital territory (FCT) as constitutionally required.

He also said Tinubu ought not to have contested the election owing to his dual citizenship of Nigeria and Guinea.