…Claims To Represent Electoral Umpire
It was more or less drama if the absurd on Friday at the continued sitting if the Ogun State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, sitting in Abeokuta, the state capital, when a subpoenaed witness called by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Eze Desmond, from GRA Road, Sagamu, who claimed to be an ad-hoc staff of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, declared that he was not aware that the commission has a lawyer.
Desmond made this declaration while undergoing cross-examination by counsel to the second respondent in the petition filed by the PDP, Governor Dapo Abiodun, Prof. Taiwo Osipitan, SAN, who objected to the documents tendered by the witness, but reserved his objection to his final address.
The witness was responding to a question put to him by Osipitan, who queried how he got the contact address of the PDP’s lawyer, who he claimed he approached, upon receiving a subpoena to appear before the tribunal.
Osipitan, while cross-examining the witness, also asked about how he got the subpoena and the address he used, to which he responded that it was addressed to him personally and not through INEC.
The witness, who was a corps member, said that he completed his mandatory service year on May 18th, and that he didn’t inform INEC about the subpoena and his intention to appear before the panel as an ad-hoc staff of the electoral umpire.
When asked about his experience on the issue of alleged violence where he worked as INEC ad-hoc staff, he said he did not witness any, contrary to what the document he tendered indicated.
Also, another PDP witness, Bamidele Aiyedun, from Ikenne, to the dismay of many, admitted that there is something wrong in his statement of oath.
Another subpoenaed witness for PDP, Oristhefe Okotipi, who claimed to have worked for INEC as an ad-hoc staff during the gubernatorial poll, could not mention the serial numbers of the booklet used for the governorship and House of Assembly elections.
He couldn’t also provide any evidence that confirm that he truly worked for INEC, as he admitted that the commission was not in the know of his appearance before the tribunal.
Meanwhile, all the counsel to the respondents expressly objected to those documents tendered before the tribunal by the PDP’s subpoenaed witnesses. They however, reserved their objections to their final addresses.
