Despite having invalid voter identification cards, a witness testified before the Lagos State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal presided over by Justice Arum Ashom that Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu and his wife Ibijoke were permitted to cast their ballots.
An agent of the Labour Party named Dayo Isreal provided this testimony on Monday after being called to testify in the petition filed by Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, the Labour Party’s candidate in the March 18 election, to overturn the election results of Governor SanwoOlu and his deputy.
The witness spoke before the court while being introduced in evidence by Senior Advocate of Nigeria and Rhodes-Vivour’s lead attorney, Olumide Ayeni. He said he worked as an agent for the Labour Party for Unit 006, Ward 15, Lagos Island Local Government during the Governorship Election.
”I observed that the card reader showed their cards to be invalid but Sanwo-Olu and his wife were allowed to cast their votes and this is against INEC’s electoral process,” Israel said before the tribunal.
The witness also stated that he was assaulted that day by several All Progressives Congress (APC) supporters and that he could tell they were APC supporters from the way they spoke during cross-examination by counsel for INEC, Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Charles Edosomwan.
“I am not a member of the Labour Party but I was assigned as an agent. When the APC thugs recognised me as an LP agent, they beat me up. They also said if voters did not vote for APC, they would beat them too,” he said.
When asked to detail how he was beaten by counsel to Governor Sanwo Olu Olu and his deputy, Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Muiz Banire.
He added, “During casting of votes, 4 of them beat me up. I ran away, changed my clothes to disguise myself and came back to monitor the counting of votes.”
Additionally, he mentioned instances where voters cast numerous ballots, but INEC officials did nothing to stop them.
“I observed more than 3-4 people voting more than once at the polling unit. INEC staff conducted the elections, though they looked the other way when this was going on.”
The witness revealed that a total of 126 people were accredited at the voting location where Governor Sanwo-Olu cast his ballot, and that APC received 121 votes while LP received two votes when responding to questioning from counsel for the APC, Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Abiodun Owonikoko.
Sam Okpala, the secretary of the Labour Party in Lagos State, was another summoned witness who gave testimony before the tribunal.
The subpoena was presented to the tribunal through the witness under the direction of the petitioner’s attorney, Folagbade Benson, which prompted more objections from the respondents.
In its ruling, the tribunal took the respondents’ objections into consideration but still allowed them to hear the witness’ testimony while directing them to mention those objections in their final written responses.
The witness claimed he would not have appeared before the tribunal if he had not been subpoenaed and added that he had never written a statement while being cross-examined by INEC’s attorney.
The tribunal has postponed the hearing on the petition until July 3 in the interim.
