OSUN ELECTION TRIBUNAL UPDATE: No voter was intimidated or harassed on the day of election- Witness. By Ibrahim Lawal Esq The 1st Respondent continued today with a witness from Ward 2 unit 2 Osogbo Local Government. The 24year old lady, Sanusi Balikis Abiola, stated in her testimony that she was an ordinary voter without affiliation to any political party. She explained in details how accreditation was done in her unit and insisted that everybody that presented him or herself for accreditation were accredited. She also stated that votes were counted openly and result announced openly at the polling unit. Under cross-examination by the learned counsel for the Petitioners, she stated that she was at the polling unit throughout the accreditation period until voting ended. She was asked about her age and she said she is 24 but as at the time of registration in 2011 she was 21. She was further asked whether she know a form called EC8A and she answered in the affirmative. She further stated that the form EC8A was shown to them before election and she saw them recording the result in the form after the election. She saidi am aware that there is a form called EC8A as Aregbesola has always being telling us before election that where INEC did not show us Form EC8A, we should not allow election to go on until the form is produced. The second witness for the day is Alade Rauf Wahab a pensioner who voted in Ward 4 Unit 7, Ede North Local Government. He gave evidence as to the orderly manner in which voting was conducted. When he was asked how many minute does it take him to get accredited, he answered by saying that because there were long queue and it took him 45 minutes to get to the presiding officer but took him just 2 minutes to do the accreditation proper. He was also asked during cross-examination whether INEC people gave him a number after accreditation which he answered in the negative. He further gave evidence that they were directed to look for their name at the register pasted on the wall and he was the one that gave the INEC people hia number on the register for accreditation. When he was directed to paragraph 9 of his witness statement on oath where he said that there was no collaboration between the INEC and the Respondent, he was asked how did he know there was no collaboration when he os an ordinary voter. The witness answered in the following manner.the reason why i said there was no collaboration was because before election, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola made it clear to all voters that they should wait behind after casting their votes and ensure that votes are counted, announced and recorded in Form EC8A. The high point of the cross-examination was when the witness was confronted with paraph 1 of his witness statement on oath where he claimed he voted in unit 6 instead of unit 7 that he told the court. The witness replied by saying the ward 6 in the paragraph was a typographical error as the heading of his witness statement of oath reads Ward 4 unit 7 where he voted. He maintained he was a willing witness and nobody brought him to court to come and testify. The 3rd witness was Hafeez Bello, A civil Engineering gradute of Lauthec testified as a voter in Ward 4 unit 10, Ede North Local Government. He gave evidence under cross examination that he did not leave the polling unit until the end of the voting. He maintained under cross-examination that election was done in an atmosphere devoid of rancour and acrimony. The learned counsel for the petitioner asked him what does he do and the witness replied he is unemployed. He was asked whether he knew a scheme called OYES in which answered in the affirmative. He was then asked to tell the court what ia it about?.the witness said OYes is a scheme for youth empowerment. He asked him whether he is a member and the witness replied in the negative and when he asked him why he did not apply since he is unemployed, the witness said it is by choice. The witness was confronted with the register of voters and in the column for occupation, student was written, the witness explained that as at that time he was yet to be mobilisef to NYSC and technically he was still a student. The last witness for the day was Abdulrasheed Okeowo a voter from ward 4 unit 2, Boripe Local Government. He stated in his evidence that election was done in a free and fair manner and no one was deprived of voting. He said that votes were openly sorted out counted,announced and entered in form EC8A and copies given to all the agents present. During cross-examination, he was asked whether the duplicate given to the agent were stamped which answered in the negative. He maintained he was not a member of any political party and he came out of his own volition to give evidence of what he saw at his unit. After the testimony of the last witness for the day, the 1st respondent ask for an adjournment till Thursday to enable them attend the APC National Convention billed for tomorrow as a lot of them are involved. The court granted the application and adjourned till Thursday for continuation Of hearing.
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 15:15:03 +0000
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