Former Vice President and the Presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the just concluded election and his party officially launched their bid to reclaim what they referred to as “stolen mandate”, raising another round of tension in the country.
The petitioners filed a petition at the elections tribunal on Monday March 18 in Abuja, against the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the victory of President Muhammadu Buhari in the polls. Atiku and PDP in the petition claimed that the INEC computer server shows that he won the February 23 presidential election with about 1.6 million votes to defeat incumbent Buhari.
In the petition the former Vice President is also relying on 50 sets of documents, filed before the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal in Abuja against INEC, President Buhari and the APC respectively.
INEC had on February 27, declared that President Buhari won the election with 15,191,847 votes to defeat Atiku, who it said polled 11,262,978 votes, but Atiku and his party cried foul insisting that the elections were massively rigged.
Atiku and the PDP stated in their 139-page petition that “from the data in the 1st respondent’s (INEC’s) server…the true, actual and correct results” from “state to state computation” showed that Abubakar Atiku polled a total of 18,356,732 votes to defeat President Buhari whom they said scored 16,741,430 votes.
The petition said further that the results were the total votes scored by the candidates in 35 states and the Federal Capital Territory Abuja, as there was “no report on server” about the results from Rivers State as of February 25. By this, Abubakar Atiku claimed to have defeated President Buhari with 1,615,302 votes.
Atiku also in the petition resuscitated the allegation that President Buhari was not qualified to contest the election on the grounds that he did not possess the constitutional minimum qualification of a school certificate.
The five grounds of the petition read, “The 2nd respondent (Buhari) was not duly elected by the majority of lawful votes cast at the election.
“The election of the 2nd respondent is invalid by reason of corrupt practices.
“The election of the 2nd Respondent is invalid by reason of non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act, 2010 (as amended).
“The 2nd respondent was at the time of the election not qualified to contest the said election.
“The 2nd respondent submitted to the 1st Respondent an affidavit containing false information of a fundamental nature in aid of his qualification for the said election.”
Atiku’s bid appears to have been boosted by the reports on Friday March 22, that the election tribunal in Osun State had declared that the PDP candidate in the September 22, 2018, governorship election, Ademola Adeleke won the election in the state against Gboyega Oyetola of the APC, which INEC declared as the winner.
Speaking to BDSUNDAY on Friday, a political analyst and the National Chairman of the United Democratic Party (UDP), Godson Okoye, said that Atiku will reclaim his mandate in court as there were obvious discrepancy in the results the INEC declared in the presidential election which he said did not tally with overall results of the elections.
“If you want to know the result once you sum up valid votes in all the polling stations across the country you will have the results of the election, which is what the server posted before they made it public. So in the fulness of time, Atiku will be president, we are very optimistic about that. It is just a minor delay and delay is not denial. In the fulness of time justice will be done,” he said.
Meanwhile, leaders of thought and elder statesmen from four of the geo-political zones of the country, have also backed Atiku’s decision to go to court to challenge the results of the election, stressing that the “results cannot stand the scrutiny of any self-respecting court.”
The leaders under the aegis of Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum, in a statement on Thursday also called on the judiciary to shun what they termed “the climate of fear that pervades Nigeria and do justice because the entire world would like the judiciary to do the needful.”
The leaders in the statement in Abuja after a meeting at the Asokoro residence of Edwin Clark denounced the 2019 electoral process especially that of the presidential election, stressing that the process fell below the minimum standards.
In the statement issued by Yinka Odumakin for South West; Chigozie Ogbu for South East; Bassey Henshaw for South-South and Isuwa Dogo for Middle Belt, the elders and leaders said the total subversion of the will of the people was traceable to President Muhammadu Buhari’s refusal to sign amended Electoral Act into law.
However, a legal practitioner and political analyst, Kayode Ajulo, believes that Atiku’s petition is “dead on arrival,” claiming that the former Vice President was not eligible to contest the election because he was not a citizen of Nigeria by birth.
Ajulo, who is a Constitutional Lawyer and Secretary of Forward with Buhari independent campaign team, revealed in a statement made available to BDSUNDAY on Friday, that a source close to him has concluded plans to go to court to challenge the legibility of Atiku to contest.
Quoting relevant laws, the source according to Kayode, said Atiku Abukakar is not fit to contest. “Atiku is from Jada town in Adamawa State of Nigeria. However, Jada used to be in Ganye Local Government Area in Adamawa. Ganye is regarded as the mother of the whole Chamba tribe. Jada is a town and Local Government Area of Adamawa State, Nigeria. Jada as a Local Government Area was created from Ganye Local Government Area of Adamawa State, Nigeria.
“Ganye, however, was never part of Nigeria legally until the February 1961 plebiscite where the people of the then Northern Cameroon voted to join Nigeria. The area had been entrusted to Britain by a League of Nations mandate in 1919 and later as Trust Territory by the United Nations in 1946.
“With the defeat of Germany in World War I, Kamerun became a League of Nations mandate territory and was split into French Cameroons and British Cameroons in 1919. While France integrated the economy of their part of Cameroon with that of France, the British administered theirs from neighboring Nigeria, making Atiku’s Jada a British franchise.
“A plebiscite was held in British Cameroons to determine whether the people preferred to stay in Cameroon or align with Nigeria. While Northern Cameroon preferred a union with Nigeria, Southern Cameroon chose alignment with their mother country,” he said.
He said further that: “On June 1, 1961, Northern Cameroon became part of Nigeria, and on October 1, 1961, the Southern territory dissolved into Cameroon.
“Ganye, which incorporates Atiku’s birthplace of Jada was the headquarters of British Cameroons, but following the plebiscite, joined Nigeria. It is instructive to note that when Atiku was on November 25, 1946 born to a trader and farmer, Garba Abubakar, Jada village and other parts of Chamba land in the then Northern Cameroon were still known as British Cameroons.
“It is interesting to also note that none of Atiku’s parents or grandparents was born in Nigeria. Atiku’s ancestral origin is deeply rooted in the then Northern Cameroon,” he said.
He stressed further that since the Nigerian constitution clearly states that only a citizen qualifies to contest for any election, he quoted Section 5 of the Constitution which states that (1) The following persons are citizens of Nigeria by birth, namely- (a) Every person born in Nigeria before the date of independence either of whose parents or any of whose grandparents belongs or belonged to a community indigenous to Nigeria. Provided that a person shall not become a citizen of Nigeria by virtue of this section if neither of his parents nor any of his grandparents was born in Nigeria.
(b) Every person born in Nigeria after the date of Independence either of whose parents or any of whose grandparents is a citizen of Nigeria; and (c) Every person born outside Nigeria either of whose parents is a citizen of Nigeria.
“(2) In this section, “the date of independence” means the 1st day of October 1960.”
“As it can be gleaned from the facts already supplied herein, Ganye which incorporates Atiku’s birthplace of Jada was the headquarters of British Cameroons, but it joined Nigeria following the plebiscite.”
According to Ajulo, the provision of Subsection 1(c) cannot still avail Atiku because there are two conditions precedent that must be satisfied, viz: 1) he must be born outside Nigeria; and any of his parents must be Nigerian citizen.
Quoting the source, Ajulo said “Atiku was born outside Nigeria (the then Northern Cameroon) and none of his parents was a Nigerian citizen.”
He therefore, submitted that the Constitution is supreme and its provisions have binding force on all authorities and persons throughout the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“This informs the reasons why we are approaching the law court to enforce this,” he said.
Innocent Odoh, Abuja
