The Presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the February 25 Presidential election, Mr. Peter Obi, on Thursday, asked for the Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC, order to Interrogate the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on the competence of experts that handled it’s Information and Communication Technology ICT) during February 25 general election.
In two separate motions argued on his behalf by Mr. Patrick Ikweto, SAN, Obi sought to know the quality of the ICT experts deployed in the use of technology for the conduct of the election.
Obi and LP in the motions prayed to the Court to compel INEC to supply them with names and profiles of ICT personnel that handled the technical aspects of the election.
They posed 12 questions to be forwarded to the electoral body for answers so as to aid him and LP in establishing their allegations of poor conduct especially malpractices in the conduct of the election.
He claimed that the request if granted would assist him in the effective presentation of his petition challenging the declaration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as winner of the election.
However, INEC represented by Mr Kemi Pinhero, SAN objected to Obi’s bid to subject his client to interrogation through incompetent applications.
The senior lawyer argued that Obi’s applications had become belated because he brought them outside the time allowed by law.
Specifically, Pinheiro argued that such an application ought to have been brought and argued during the pre-hearing session, adding that bringing the application outside the pre-hearing session has robbed the court of jurisdiction to hear it.
He insisted that the application must fail because it is a waste of time, adding that the precious time of the court must not be expended on such a request.
President Tinubu represented by Chief Akin Olujimi, SAN, and the All Progressives Congress (APC), represented by Prince Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, also opposed the request, stating that the application is grossly incompetent in the face of the law.
Meanwhile, the Presiding Justice, Haruna Tsammani has reserved a ruling in the applications.
Justice Tsammani also fixed June 9 for a further hearing into the petition.