THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION PETITION TRIBUNAL JUDGEMENT: A COUP AGAINST NIGERIANS
The judgement by the presidential election petition tribunal has continued to raise fundamental issues about law and justice in Nigeria. There is no doubt whatsoever that the judgement was based on mere technicalities, thereby aiding and abetting electoral fraud in the country. It is curious to note that, in the judgement the justices did not admonish INEC in any way. Therefore to them INEC must did a yeoman’s job during the last election. In fact, this has emboldened INEC to say it has been vindicated by the Court of Appeal judgement, despite the outrage that greeted the April 2007 from all over the world. Yet the justices of the Supreme Court in many of there rulings have said that, the era of technicalities are gone for ever. That judgements will never be given based on technical grounds. That justice must not only be done, but must be seen to have been done. So, while will the Court of Appeal give a technical judgement that is not in the overall interest of the country. Indeed, the judgement was delivered in a very cavalier manner; the tone was harsh, brash and hostile to the petitioner. And, the whole judgement looked more or less like the final submission of INEC and PDP lawyers at the tribunal; a lot of fundamental issues were glossed over, the judgement went all out to fish for excuses to dismiss the petitioners claim at all cost.
It is also imperative to underscore the fact that, the judgement was written by one person and other judges did not make any input into it whatsoever. They only said the read the judgement and they concur. This is definitely not the tradition, because, the judgement was supposed to be a landmark one, which ought to be enriched by the contributions of other judges. But this never happened. It has even be said in some quarters that the judgement was not written by any of the judges that presided at the tribunal, and this position is exemplified by the fact that Justice John Fabiyi who read the judgement did not do it properly, he stumbled on some many words, and was lost in several instances, it was like he was seeing the judgement for the first time. There is no doubt that he was thoroughly confused. And according to the account of Sahara reporters, few days to the judgement day, huge sums of money exchanged hands, and nobody has controverted this claim.
Furthermore, the dashed expectations at the outcome of the legal tussle derived essentially from the conviction that the election would not stand the test of judicial scrutiny, especially as the major beneficiary of the discredited elections, Yar’Adua himself, had reportedly owned up that the process that yielded him as president was a mockery of electoral process. Indeed, to demonstrate his conviction in that regard, he had gone on to constitute an electoral reform committee, ostensibly to make for credible elections in the future.
Again, a commentator reasoned that, “the Appeal Court Justices main ground for dismissing the petition was lack of evidence or proof on the part of the petitioners. And, from all indications, it will be almost an impossible task to provide enough proof to upturn a presidential poll. The Justices placed an uphill onus on the petitioners not only to prove that irregularities took place, but also to show that such irregularities were on such a scale as to warrant the cancellation of poll. The most intriguing aspect of it was the issue dealing with the alleged involvement of soldiers, policeman and political thugs in snatching ballot papers and shooting to scare voters so as to clear the way for electoral fraud. This is a rampant occurrence that mars Nigerian elections. The Appeal Court dismissed this matter on the ground that the unknown soldiers/policemen/thugs were not produced. Even if they were produced, the petitioners would still be asked to prove how their activities would warrant cancellation”. Hence, Justice Ogebe’s court did not in any way teach any one the useful lesson which other tribunals have been dishing out- that electoral crimes do not pay.
In the same token, Chairman, Nigerians United for Democracy, Dr. Tunji Braithwaite said in a statement that, “we reject the judgement of the presidential elections petitions tribunal that validates the election of the most corrupt and scandalous election ever conducted anywhere in the world….our people, being very outraged by the effrontery of the bare-faced stolen mandate, became agitated and restless, to the extent they were ready for action. But some among us counseled patience in the face of the massive fraud, urging that the law courts be allowed to adjudicate the manifestly and patently sham elections in order to aid democracy in Nigeria. Without denigrating the sanctity and the integrity of the judicial process in an ideal democracy, this judgement has nearly made nonsense of that advice of patience”.
In a similar development, Dr. Arthur Nwankwo of the People’s Mandate Party said that, “in the verdict, we see an inconsistent judiciary that is not capable of rising above the shenanigans of political expediency and a judiciary that is committed to the decapitation of every thing our people hold sacrosanct and also the suffocation of the common wealth and our struggle for the sustenance of our democracy”. And The Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre remarked that, “the judgement was unduly technical. It is unsound for the court to hold that failure to serialize the ballot papers was non-compliance with provision of the electoral act 2006 and to hold that the non-compliance was not material enough to invalidate the election. That is judicial double- speak that is highly regrettable and condemnable. How would anyone know the exact number of ballot papers that were used for the election if they were not serialized according to law”?
Also, the General Secretary of the Alliance for Credible Elections, Mr. Emma Ezeazu, said, “We are terribly disappointed at the judgement. The tribunal has just made a statement in Nigeria that playing by the rules and having a level playing ground is not necessary in our country and we are very, very concerned about this”. Similarly, the Action Congress candidate in the April 14, 2007 governorship election in Osun State, Rauf Aregbesola, noted that the judgement was a dangerous signal for democratic governance in Nigeria. Picking holes in the ruling, the AC candidate observed that the tribunal prevented the petitioners from calling oral evidence only for the panel to blame the petitioners for not calling same in the prosecution of the petition. He said: “this judgement is a betrayal of the confidence which Nigerians have reposed in the judiciary as the last hope of the common man”.
Dr. Chidi Amuta in his own response contended that, “if the ruling of the presidential election is allowed to stand, we may have saved the nation the immediate inconvenience of facing the consequences of basing the political edifice on fraud. But in the long run, this infamy will not go away. What the tribunal has done is in fact to accord judicial recognition to rigging”. The NLC has come out to say the judgement had demonstrated that the nation’s jurisprudence needed to be improved to ease the process of proving electoral infractions, as the judiciary he maintained is not a substitute for evolving an electoral system with sufficient credibility and integrity. It said the nation has grapple with the challenge of developing a credible electoral system that will allow voters to chose their leaders rather than leave the matter in the hands of some five judges. And, it is very important o stress that, the government has no right whatsoever to use the military to intimidate the people from exercising their fundamental human rights.
So, there is no reason whatsoever, why the presidential election tribunal will out rightly dismiss the plea of the petitioners. Some people have said that the petitioners ought to have proved their case beyond all reasonable doubt, but the petitioners brought bag loads of evidences to the Tribunal which were not adequately and properly evaluated, and the evidences were not taken into consideration in arriving at the judgement. The judgement is very one-sided, all knocks for the petitioner and pat on the back for INEC and PDP. Therefore, this kind of political judgement, which is also very technical in content, is totally unwarranted and certainly not in the overall interest of the country.
By Jide Ayobolu,
No 19 Gongola Street,
Garki 2, Abuja .