FEATURES
Anxiety as Nigerians Await Presidential Election Petition Verdict
![](https://dailyasset.ng/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/court-of-appeal-1.jpg)
By Wandoo Sombo
…..Presidential Election Petition Verdict
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
Read Also: Atiku, PDP Close Case at Presidential Election Petition Court
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
Read Also: PEPC adjourns hearing in Labour Party, APP petitions until May 10
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
Read Also: Speech President Muhammadu Buhari While Signing into Law, 2022 Appropriation Bill
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
**If used, please credit the author and the News Agency of Nigeria.
Anxiety as Nigerians await Presidential election petition verdict
A news analysis by Wandoo Sombo, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
Judgement is around the corner. In the week ahead Nigerians the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court, (PEPC) will deliver its verdict on the controversial 2023 presidential election.
What will the decision of the court portend for Nigeria’s political growth and democracy consolidation?
Whether President Tinubu triumphs over his adversaries or the other way round, given the presence of social media, there is no doubt that this is one of the most followed in Nigeria’s presidential election petitions history.
All the parties in the case have played their roles the rest is now in the hands of the court led by Justice Haruna Tsammani
“The judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court is one that will make history or make misery,’’ says Mr Emmanuel Ogebe, a United States-based human rights lawyer.
Alhaji Abubakar Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) as well as Mr Peter Obi and the Labour PArty are challenging the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential election at the PEPC.
On Aug.1, parties in the petition were summoned by the Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of justices to adopt their final addresses which would give room for the final judgment.
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN) reports that the adoption of final addresses is the precursor to fixing a date for judgment.
This battle before judgment is delivered is also referred to as closing or final arguments whereby parties bring together all the arguments they had canvassed in one single document.
In this case, as directed by the five-member panel of justices, it was a forty-page document.
The final address gives counsel the opportunity to emphasise, highlight and buttress their key points in adumbrations which simply put is the act of giving the main facts and not details about something.
The atmosphere around the Court of Appeal premises, where the PEPC is sitting on the day of the adoption of the final address was different.
Atiku whose only appearance in court was during the its inaugural sitting on March 8 was present on this day.
Obi had been a regular in court from day one but on this day, there was something unique about his entourage.
The award winning author, Chimamanda Adichie was part of the supporters that followed Obi to court.
This did not go unnoticed as several fans thronged the section of the court reserved for the petitioners and their supporters, to get a closer glimpse of her, shake her hand, and of course take pictures.
Tsammani announced that the time allotted to each counsel to adopt their address and adumbrate was 20 minutes.
It is important to note that the court had alternated the time for the petitioners’ to be in court between morning and afternoon shifts each week.
On this day, Atiku and the PDP had the morning session.
The three respondents; the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, (APC) took turns adopting their 40-paged final addresses.
Mr Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, counsel to INEC prayed the court to dismiss the petition for lacking in merit.
Mahmoud insisted that the presidential election was validly conducted in substantial compliance with all the relevant laws.
Mr Wole Olanipekin, SAN, counsel to Tinubu also prayed the court to dismiss the petition for grossly lacking in merit and substance.
The senior lawyer maintained that the petitioners failed to place valid evidence before the court to assist it in delivering a judgement in their favour.
“No where did the petitioner draw the court’s attention to the number of votes scored by him, the court is not a “father Christmas”.
“The court cannot give to the petitioners what they did not ask for,” Olanipekun said.
Mr Lateef Fagbemi, counsel to the APC, equally urged the court to dismiss the petition for failing to provide evidence to back the claim of electoral malpractices.
On alleged criminal activities involving Tinubu, Fagbemi said Tinubu was given a clean bill as far as any criminal indictment is concerned in the United States.
On the issue of dual citizenship, Fagbemi said that Sections 137 and 28 of the Constitution postulated that a citizen of a country by birth, such as Tinubu, could not be disqualified from contesting an election on the grounds of dual citizenship.
He also submitted that there was no document to substantiate the allegation of forging of university certificates.
“There is no document from the University of Chicago denying that he attended school there”, he argued.
Mr Chris Uche, SAN, counsel to the petitioners, in adopting his final address, prayed the court to declare that Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential election and declare his client, Atiku winner.
In the alternative, he asked the court to nullify the election and order a re-run or fresh election.
The petitioners hinged their request on the grounds that INEC, in spite of receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately manipulated their system to deny them victory.
“It is our submission that it was a deliberate manipulation to bypass all the technological innovations introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.
“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results and secondly, to enhance the integrity of results declared.
Uche said that his clients were vehemently objecting to the submission of INEC that there was a technical glitch on the election day.
He also said that in such a situation, the burden was on INEC to explain the glitch which they failed to.
He prayed the court to discountenance the objections of the respondents and grant all the reliefs of his clients adding that “let justice be done and the heavens will not fall.”
Obi and his party, who took the afternoon shift on this day, are asking the PEPC to annul Tinubu’s election.
They said their request is based on the grounds of substantial noncompliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act 2022 and guidelines for the conduct of the election by INEC.
Mahmoud again, in adopting the final written address on behalf of INEC, submitted that Obi and LP’s petition should be dismissed for lacking in merit.
He told the court that the petitioners failed to show that there was electronic collation of results anywhere in the country during the election as they claimed.
Mahmoud argued that what was in the place of electronic collation was the manual collation system.
On the technical glitch, Mahmoud said the petitioners failed to prove the allegation that the glitch was caused by human interference.
He said, “The glitch that occurred, which affected transmission for about four hours did not affect the election results.’’
For his part, Tinubu, through Olanipekun said, from the results declared, he scored the number of votes across the 36 states of the federation and Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
He added that, there was no nexus between the petition and the reliefs sought and urged the court to dismiss the petition for, “being a jurisprudential fiction”.
The APC through Fagbemi argued that in this petition, even if the court ordered a re-run of the presidential election, Obi was not qualified to participate.
He said this was because it was a two-horse race between a winner of an election and the person who came second in the election.
Fagbemi said the FCT did not enjoy any special status as far as the presidential election was concerned.
Mr Livy Uzoukwu (SAN), lead counsel to Obi and Labour party told the court that the respondents had laboured in vain to degrade and dismiss the importance of IReV in the election.
He said that the Supreme Court held in the case of Oyetola and INEC that IReV was part of an electoral process.
Uzoukwu also submitted that an election in which 18,088 blurred results were uploaded to INEC portal was a very poor election.
He added that it was not in doubt that Tinubu forfeited the sum of $460, 000, being proceeds of narcotics trafficking.
After all parties had taken their turn, the court adjourned both petitions for judgment to a date to be communicated to the parties.
The fate of country is now in the hands of the judiciary as barring any unforeseen circumstances; the PEPC is expected to deliver its judgment sometime in September.
There is anxiety amidst high expectations of the judgment political pundits posit would either set a precedence or be business as usual.
As explained by Ogebe, he judgement of the court is an entirely democratic process.
The majority wins but the minority still has the right to express their opinion in a minority judgment.
It is expected that in the event of an appeal to the Supreme Court, that minority judgment maybe revived into the majority opinion.
So the dissenting justices are expected to write their opinion as thoroughly and persuasively as though it were the majority judgment itself.
Notwithstanding the above, judges who are not writing the lead judgment or the lead dissent, can merely, if they so choose, write a sentence or two stating they “agree” with either the lead majority ruling or the minority ruling.
They can either add additional reasons why or simply adopt the reasons stated in the lead or minority ruling. The ball is on the court of the judges. The nation is on the edge. (NANFeatures)
FEATURES
Time for Nigeria to Focus on Solid Minerals Sector
![](https://dailyasset.ng/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Nigeria-Flag-flying-at-the-Lagos-Police-College-Ikeja-to-mark-Nigeria-Independent.-Photo-Idowu-Ogunleye-e1443701659532.jpg)
Nigeria’s solid mineral sector, which was once crucial to the nation’s economy, lost that recognition immediately the nation found oil.
But, with the decreasing oil revenue, the President Bola Tinubu-led administration is revitalising the solid mineral sector and developing its infrastructure to attract foreign investments.
According to the Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr Dele Alake, the sector is being repositioned as a major driver of the nation’s economic growth.
As the minister strives toward achieving this goal, critical stakeholders in the industry have emphasised the need to sustain the efforts to meet the goal of diversifying the economy.
One such stakeholder, Mr Mikali Mumuni, believes that the sector has the potential to significantly create wealth and numerous employment opportunities.
Mumini, the Managing Director of Miners Communication Limited, publishers of Miner Magazine, says that the sector is “too good to be ignored”.
“Today, it is dawning upon us that we can no longer depend solely on oil because of the vagaries of international oil market.
“It has become obvious that Nigeria is now earning less and less income from oil.
“Apparently, this is the reason why successive governments have been talking of diversifying the nation’s economic base.
“One of the easiest and surest way to do this is to refocus attention on the solid minerals sector.
“The sector has the highest capacity to create multiple employment opportunities for our teeming population, particularly the youth.
“Basically, the solid mineral sector has been long neglected because of the discovery of oil which made some public policy analysts argued that oil made the nation lazy.
“The reality is dawning on the nation that the holiday is over. It is time to face the reality,” he told newsmen recently.
Mr Abidoye Abiosun, Marketing Director of Miners Communication, while corroborating Mumini, identified lithium as one solid mineral that had gained global focus.
“From what I observed, the Nigerian government is prioritising the expansion and development of its lithium resources in the country.
“The idea is to generate power without polluting the environment.
“To the best of my knowledge, lithium is the major focus in the whole world and that is why, I think, the Nigerian government is really focusing attention on its expansion and development.
“When you are looking at the area of power generation without polluting the air, creating nuisance and ecological hazard, lithium is the safest,” he said.
Abiosun speaks further on the solid mineral.
“Lithium is also the mineral resource crucial to the production of battery used in the generation of solar energy and other similar products.
“With records showing that Nigeria has a very large deposit of lithium, it should be annexed, properly looked into, and tapped so that it would be a ready-made replacement and alternative to oil.
“Lithium is a versatile element with various applications. Lithium-ion batteries power electric vehicles, mobile devices and renewable energy systems.
“This is due to their high energy density and long lifespan.
“Lithium carbonate is used as a medication to treat bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety disorders.
“Lithium is also used in nuclear reactors as a neutron absorber and in nuclear fusion research.
“Lithium oxide is used to produce specialised glass and ceramics with unique properties. Lithium-based lubricants are used in industrial applications due to their high performance and resistance to extreme temperatures.
“It has long been established that lithium-ion batteries have a high energy-to-weight ratio, making them ideal for portable electronics and electric vehicles.
“This is just as lithium-ion batteries can be charged and discharged many times without losing capacity.
“Lithium carbonate also helps stabilise mood and reduce symptoms of mental health conditions.
“Lithium’s ability to absorb neutrons makes it useful in nuclear applications.
“Lithium-based materials have high thermal resistance, making them suitable for extreme temperature applications,” he explained.
Expectedly, stakeholders have lauded government’s efforts in taking steps to reactivate mining licences and address security concerns so as to make the sector more attractive to investors.
They note that Alake has launched the mineral resources database through which anybody that is interested in investing in solid minerals could access information on which part of the country he or she could get a particular mineral or the other.
The minister said recently that investors could express interest where such lies.
The government has also created the Mining Marshall to make the different mining sites safer for investors as well as miners.
Just recently, President Bola Tinubu gave a matching order to the armed forces to redouble their efforts at curbing illegal mining.
“This, to me, is a great assurance to investors in the mining sector,” Mumuni said.
For Abiosun, the renewed interest on the mineral resources sector by Alake and the Federal Government is commendable and must be supported.
“I think it is a very good step in the right direction,” Abiosun says.
Analysts have, however, said that there is the need to review mining licences as many had been issued but not activated.
“If the government is looking at generating employment through solid mineral and mineral resources in the country, all the mining licence that have been given out, need to be activated.
“Serious investors need to invest in the sector, start action and, at the end of the day, the unemployment rate in the country would have decreased.
“We look at majority of our youths that are at home unemployed; they will have areas in which they can be useful at the mining sites and other activities that are associated with mining in the country.
“I think the Federal Government is taking the right step in the right direction,” Abiosun says.
Stakeholders have also emphasised the need for specialised media coverage to promote and support the growth of the sector.
Mumini emphasises this.
“As journalists, it is our duty to ensure that we do not lower the bar of reportage of the sector.
“This is what forced some of us to come up with the idea of the Miners Communication outfit under which we currently have a monthly news magazine solely devoted to reporting the solid mineral sector.
“It is the only magazine that is doing that in the country. We have taken the lead and we are determined to consistently do this by highlighting the diverse and vast opportunities that abound in the sector,” Mumuni says.
Abiosun notes further: “This is an aspect of journalism that has not been looked into.
“The area is a growing sector and it is a genre that we need to encourage just the way the Nigerian government is trying to encourage the mineral resources industry.” (NANFeatures)
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X-raying Wike’s First Year as FCT Minister
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Shortly after assuming office as FCT minister on Aug. 21, 2023, Mr Nyesom Wike announced short, medium, and long-term plans to restore the Abuja Master Plan.
Wike, along with FCT minister of state Mariya Mahmoud, explained that overhauling the FCT would reposition it to be among the best cities in the world in line with President Bola Tinubu’s “Renewed Hope Agenda”.
He added that emphasis would be placed on infrastructural development, taking one project at a time, to restore the city to its glory.
The minister said that development would also be extended to the six Area Councils as part of strategies to decongest the city and open rural economy.
Sadly, Wike was confronted with the sight of abandoned projects that characterised the capital city.
The minister noted that FCT had, over the years, witnessed foundation laying ceremonies of several structures worth billions, only to be abandoned midway or at advanced stages of the construction.
While assessing them, he pointed out that some of the contracts were awarded in 2007, some in 2011, while others were awarded between 2015 and 2017, with all abandoned.
Confronting the challenge, Wike said that revenue leakages would be blocked so as to mobilise the needed resources for infrastructural development in the FCT.
“I will ensure that Abuja gets the best. You will see projects upon projects, and projects that will be completed and not abandoned.
“I am not a party to abandoned projects. I start a project when there is money as such we will look into our finances before we begin any project,” the minister had said.
Innovatively, Wike got most of the contractors back to site after agreeing on a payment plan with money from the FCT Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) and 2023 Supplementary Budget.
To improve IGR, the minister inaugurated a Task Force on the issuance of Certificates of Occupancy for mass housing developments and the recovery of land use contravention fees in the FCT.
He equally introduced innovations and enforced the payment of outstanding ground rents and other taxes in the FCT, a decision that increased the territory’s revenue generation significantly.
This is evident with the recent declaration of N126.54 billion collected and remitted between January and June by the FCT Internal Revenue Service.
The then acting Executive Chairman of the service, Mr Haruna Abdullahi, said that the figure was 53.5 per cent higher than the N82.46 billion collected in the first half of 2023.
The minister also secured the approval of Tinubu to withdraw FCTA from Treasury Single Account, to enable the administration to access funds from financial institutions to fund projects.
These initiatives paid off, as nine months later, the Wike-led FCTA announced the completion of numerous projects which were inaugurated in May to celebrate Tinubu’s one year in office.
Some of the projects included the official residence of the Vice President, the Abuja Rail Mass Transit system, Inner Southern Expressway from the Outer Southern Expressway to the Southern Parkway.
Others are full scope development of about 6.7km of 10 lanes Outer Southern Expressway from Villa Roundabout to Ring Road 1 Junction, and construction of Southern Parkway from the Christian Centre to Ring Road 1, named after President Bola Tinubu.
Equally inaugurated were the completed B6 (Constitution Avenue)/B12 (Independence Avenue) roads in Central Area, and Wuye interchange bridge.
The full scope development of the Arterial Road, N-20, from Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Expressway to Murtala Mohammed Expressway, was also partly completed and named after noble laurel Wole Soyinka.
Another milestone of the Wike-led FCTA was the completion of engineering infrastructure in Guzape District Lot II, and the resurfacing of 189 roads covering 57km within Abuja city centre among others.
He assured that other ongoing projects would be completed by December 2024, including the rehabilitation and resurfacing of 366 roads in Wuse, Garki, Asokoro and Maitama Districts, covering 117 km.
Also ongoing are the rehabilitation of District Hospital Gwarimpa, Cottage Hospital Gwagwalada and District Hospital Utako, Greater Abuja Water Supply Project and rehabilitation of 19 public primary and secondary schools across the territory.
The minister also recently inaugurated the construction of three bus terminals in the FCT to ensure a secure and convenient travel experience for commuters in the FCT.
He also inaugurated the construction of the Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal Complex to strengthen the administration of justice.
Road users and residents described the feat as unprecedented, saying that Wike was the best thing that had happened to FCT.
“I have been living in Abuja for 16 years but never witnessed a speedy delivery of road projects until Wike happened.
“Look at the road to Asokoro from Apo, which was under construction for several years, but Wike delivered it in just eight months,” said a resident, Mr Andrew Moses.
Similarly, Mr Shuabu Yunusa, a taxi driver said, “It is now seamless going to Asokoro from Apo. The Tinubu-led administration is really working and deserved our commendation.”
In keeping to his promise not to leave rural communities behind in the development agenda, the minister has inaugurated the construction of rural roads of more than 42.2km across the six Area Councils and promised to complete them by December.
Similarly, the minister has also handed over Staff of Office to four newly coronated Chiefs of Karu, Kwali, Pai, and Yaba, as part of measures to strengthen traditional institutions and improve governance in communities.
According to him, the traditional rulers are expected to draw the attention of the government to any development, security and other issues that require government attention and response.
Beyond infrastructural development, stakeholders said that Wike has carved his name in gold by ensuring the implementation of the FCT Civil Service Commission (CSC), 2018, against all odds.
The minister, on Oct. 13, 2023, announced President Tinubu’s approval for the establishment of CSC for the FCTA, in line with the provisions of the law.
This, he said, was to allow career progression for civil servants in the Administration, from director to permanent secretary and, hopefully, Head of Civil Service.
On March 12, Wike announced Tinubu’s approval for the appointment of Mr Udo Atang, as pioneer Head of Civil Service of the FCTA.
Mr Emeka Ezeh was also appointed Chairman of the Commission’s Board, along with six others as commissioners, representing the six geopolitical zones.
Similarly, 10 other directors in the FCTA were appointed as pioneer Permanent Secretaries for various Secretariats of the Administration.
The excited pioneer head of FCT civil service, described the development as a demonstration of the reality of the renewed hope agenda of the Tinubu-led government.
Commending Tinubu and Wike for renewing the hope of FCT workers, Atang said: “the staff of the Administration have never had it this good.
“In the new FCTA system, every member of staff is a potential permanent secretary and head of service.”
To ensure gender equality, as well as women and youth participation in governance, Wike, within one year in office, has created Women Affairs Secretariat and Youth Development Secretariat.
This has increased the number of secretariats in the FCTA from eight to 10 with a view to ensure inclusive governance.
On security, the Wike-led FCTA has supported security agencies, including vigilante groups, with motorcycles and operational vehicles, fitted with modern communication gadgets.
This, according to him, is to enable security agencies to navigate hard-to-reach communities in rural areas and improve security operations within the city.
Wike equally inaugurated a Joint Task Force, consisting of all security agencies in the FCT, to curb the menace of “one chance” and another to curtail the activities of arm rubbers, kidnappers and all forms of crimes within the FCT and its environment.
While assessing the performance of the Wike-led FCTA on security, Mr Adamu Gwary, Director, Security Services Department, FCTA, argued that the impact was impressive, considering the reduced incidents of security breaches.
Sharing Gwary’s view, Prof. Kailani Muhammed, Director-General of the Confederation of All Progressives Congress said that FCT had become a safe haven where residents could afford to sleep with their two eyes closed.
Despite the laudable feats within one year in office, stakeholders have stressed the need to invest more on people-oriented projects such as provision of clean water, quality health services and transportation system.
This, according to them, will impact significantly on the lives of the common residents of the FCT. (NANFeatures)
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Can 10th National Assembly Lay Petroleum Industry Challenges to Rest?
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Nigeria is a leading producer of crude in Africa and a major crude exporter in the world. Oil receipts are the major source of revenue source for the country, contributing more than 80 per cent of the country’s income.Available records from the Statista showed that Nigeria’s crude oil reserves stood at 36.
9 billion barrels and valued at roughly 74 million metric tons. The crude oil products such as premium motor spirit, otherwise known as petrol, diesel, aviation fuel known in the industry as Jet A1 are imported. They are a major drain on government’s purse.A cardinal part of President Bola Tinubu’s monetary and fiscal policies is directed at stimulating additional revenue and foreign exchange earnings with ultimate goal of improving livelihood of Nigerians.The policies are also designed to stabilise exchange rate, reduce inflation, lower interest rate and encourage investments.The petroleum sector is key in achieving these aims because virtually all economic policies revolve around it.However, recent developments in the oil seem to threaten that ambition as accusation and counter accusations bothering on corruption and sabotage have dominate news about the sector.But more disturbing is recent ugly narrative of alleged importation of hazardous and substandard petroleum products into the country.The issue of toxic petroleum product importation came to public space when the Senator representing Cross River South Senatorial District. Sen.Asuquo Ekpenyong, moved a motion on alleged toxic petroleum products importation and distribution.Ekpenyong, had at a Senate plenary on July 3, 2024, sponsored a motion for Senate to probe alleged importation of hazardous petroleum products into the country.Following a comprehensive debate on the motion, Senate consequently constituted an ad hoc committee for an investigation on the matter.The committee members, as announced by President of thee Senate, Sen. Godswill Akpabio were fifteen in number with Leader of the Senate, Sen.Opeyemi Bamidele as chairman.Alongside the onerous mandate to investigate alleged importation of toxic petroleum products, the committee was also mandated to do a comprehensive probe of the sector with a view to ending decades of irritating narratives.However, the one million question, agitating minds of Nigerians is the ability of the 10th National Assembly to end the perceived issues in the sector via the investigation, given outcome of previous investigative hearings on the sector.Interestingly, Bamidele, speaking in Abuja at an interactive session with key stakeholders in the sector re-emphasised the concerns of Nigerians on the upcoming investigation as most of them have ended up has jamborees.He said: “Will this investigative hearing end up like the previous ones?“Can the Senate really address the challenges in the petroleum industry given the entrenched interests of some powerful interests?.“These are some of the questions the media have been asking in their analyses and reports since the constitution of this ad-hoc committee on July 3.”Bamidele said the senate had been carrying out its mandate to resolve deep-seated challenges that had hitherto obstructed to smooth functioning of petroleum industry for decades.He urged all parties to jettison their differences as the committee embarks on a journey to uncover the truth about the goings on in the sector.“I therefore, assure you that we are all committed to conducting a thorough and impartial investigation across all areas outlined in the senate resolution of July 3”, he said.Bamidele said no one concerned would be exempted from the scrutiny, adding that the committee’s collective goal was to serve overriding public interest.According to him, it is truly a challenging period in the nation given that supply of refined petroleum products has been irregular and problematic.“The long queues at filling stations are also a testament to this challenge.“A situation, where we now depend almost entirely on importation of these products, even when we daily supply global oil market’s no fewer than two per cent of its crude oil needs, is to say the least, highly worrisome.Bamidele said to ensure broad participation, the committee has created a platform for the general public and stakeholders to submit memoranda before the public hearings that was slated to hold from Sept. 10 – 12.“We have accepted this huge responsibility with the resolve to make a difference.“We are also staking our integrity and safety to develop an efficient and functional regime that guarantees transparent management of strategic national resources,’’ he said.Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, said that the oil sector was bedeviled by lots of misinformation.“This investigation will do a whole lot of justice not only to the Senate but we in the Executive and key leaders in the sector.“Because of the fundamental nature of this investigation that has to do with alleged economic sabotage with importation of substandard products into the country, we urge the Senate to ensure we do a live broadcast,” he said.Similarly, at a news conference organised by the committee, Sen. Abdul Ningi said he understood reservations and pessimism of Nigerians toward outcome of upcoming investigation.“With high level of integrity of members of this committee, we are assuring you that at the end of the day we are going to have a very solid recommendations to move Nigeria forward’’, he said..Sen. Yahaya Abdullahi said from what he glimpsed from media reports, Nigerians were skeptic about the potential outcome of the investigation and its implementation.“We are people that are very much concerned with our integrity. We are here to go deep down into what is happening to see how we can add value to the governance of this country”, Ningi said.Analysts say the capacity of the committee to function rightly, given the pedigree, strength of character, quality of public service records and antecedents of its members was not in doubt, hence the expectation that it will leave above board.Should the members of the committee justify the high rating, the perception is that investigation would be the beginning of an end to the perceived challenges in the industry.Perception is one thing, reality is another. In the event that the latter is the case, what policy makers and implementers will do with the investigation outcome is another kettle of fish.Nigerians cannot afford to wait any longer to be rescued from the troubles inflicted on them by oil and gas, which in other climes is a source of blessing. (NAN