27th July, 2015
Akin Kuponiyi
The senatorial candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) for Lagos West in the 2015 general elections, Segun Adewale (Aeroland) has raised the alarm over alleged sudden disappearance of some vital documents which he tendered in support of his petition against the victory of Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Adeola winner of the election which was conducted on March 28, 2015.
Dissatisfied with INEC’s verdict, Adewale filed a petition before the National Assembly Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Ikeja to challenge Adeola’s victory.
Adewale is specifically asking the tribunal to nullify the declaration of Adeola as winner of the election.
But Adewale, in a petition written on his behalf by a group, Concerned Stakeholders of Lagos West Senatorial District, alleged that the lawyers to the defendants from the chambers of Muiz Banire, National Legal Adviser of APC, conspired with the officials of the tribunal to steal vital documents which were duly tendered in support of his petition.
The petition, dated July 8, 2015 and addressed to the Chairman of the Tribunal, was made available to our correspondent on Monday.
The Concerned Stakeholders further alleged that the theft of the vital documents was nothing but pure despicable acts of desperation on the part of the APC candidate and his lawyers to thwart the cause of justice with active connivance of the staffers of the tribunal.
The stakeholders wondered how all the documents validly tendered, sworn to and admitted in evidence, upon which Adewale was cross-examined by the defence lawyers, would suddenly disappear from the custody of the court.
They alleged further that the staff of the tribunal conspired with INEC lawyers, who they alleged are all from the same chambers of Banire, to perfect the theft of the said documents.
“Based on this premise, we wish to emphatically state with all sense of modesty that the consequential effect of the missing documents if not found and properly unraveled, will invariably taint the ruling of your the tribunal wherein the onus lies on the court to prove that all documents tendered before now be requested for verification and assessments before the ruling on the petition is delivered,” the stakeholders demanded.
The stakeholders further alleged that in a bid to cover up the theft, the lawyers to APC, INEC and Adeola have all approached the counsel to the petitioner for duplicate copies of the documents.
But when contacted, Banire said the allegation was not only strange but impossible.
Banire, who reacted via a text message, simply said: “Strange news. You know that is impossible and if anybody to direct your enquiry to, it should be the tribunal. To the best of my knowledge, never heard of that.”
In his main petition before the tribunal presided over by Justice Sylvanus Oriji, Adewale is alleging irregularities in the conduct of the election, adding that, the results submitted by wards did not correspond with the number of voters accredited by the card readers.
He also alleged that election did not hold in some wards among other irregularities.