Despite Covid-19 pandemic, the Kogi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, on Tuesday, continued its hearing on the disputed November 16, 2019 gubernatorial election, with the admission of video clips in evidence.
The video clips showing the magnitude of alleged violence that characterised the poll were tendered by the petitioner and governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Mr Musa Wada.
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Wada, who called his first witness to substantiate his allegations of electoral malpractices, had earlier called forensic analyst and writing experts.
His counsel Mr Jibrin Okutepa SAN called the first witness, Captain Joe Agada, a retired military officer through whom card reader was tendered as evidence.
The admissibility of the evidence was, however, opposed by counsel to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Dr Alex lziyon SAN, on the ground that a similar evidence had been rejected on 8th of April by the tribunal.
Izinyon informed the tribunal of a pending appeal lodged by the petitioner who is asking the Court of Appeal to direct the tribunal to admit the evidence.
Counsel for the All Progressives Congress, APC, Malam Ahmed Raji SAN and counsel for governor Yahaya Bello
Elisha Kura aligned with Iziyon that the admissibility of the evidence will amount to abuse of court process.
But Okutepa emphasised that the evidence tendered can be admitted at any stage.
Ruling on the application, the chairman of the tribunal, Justice Kashim Kaigama admitted the video clips on the election and the death certificates of some victims of the election violence.
The video evidence where election violence erupted was later played in the court.
The PDP candidate in the governorship election, Musa Wada, had filed a petition challenging the election that brought governor Yahaya Bello of the APC to power for a second tenure of office.
The PDP candidate is challenging the victory of Bello who was declared winner of the election by INEC in which Bello was said to have scored a total of 406,222 votes to defeat Wada with 189,704 votes.
