Army, Police diverted election materials for Jonathan, CPC tells tribunal

Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, yesterday, alleged before the Presidential election petition tribunal sitting in Abuja, that President Goodluck Jonathan used scores of armed policemen and soldiers to divert sensitive electoral materials that it said “caused compromise of the presidential election.”
The petitioner made this allegation on a day the five-man panel of justices on the tribunal, reserved ruling on an application by CPC, seeking leave of court to tender software evidence that it said would reveal how the April 16 Presidential election was rigged by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in connivance with the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

The panel, which was presided by Justice Kumai Bayang Akaas, reserved ruling on the application, sine-die (indefinitely), after it had listened to oral testimonies of seven witnesses who were brought to court by CPC yesterday.
Testifying in court yesterday, the witnesses, Mohammed Lawal Suleiman, Embarage Abbayi, Ibrahim Musa, Bito Martins, Bulama Waziri and Nwagbara Ogina Chijioke Eze, alleged that they saw security operatives thumb-printing ballot papers in Zamfara, Taraba, Jigawa, Abia, Cross River, Sokoto and Enugu states.

Tribunal rejects respondents’plea
Spirited efforts by counsel to the respondents to persuade the tribunal not to hear the oral evidence was rebuffed by presiding Justice Akaas, who gave the witnesses the nod to narrate their experiences.

Source:  Vanguard Newspaper