2023 PEPC judgment: INEC Not Under Obligation To Transmit Election Results Electronically...

By Iheanyi Chukwudi

The Presidential Election Petition Court has held that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was at liberty to transmit results of elections however it wanted, and not only electronically.

Ruling in Peter Obi and the Labour Party petition challenging the victory of Bola Tinubu in the 2023 presidential election, whereby the petitioners argued that the electoral body, INEC failed to transmit election results from the polling units to the collation centres electronically, Justice Tasmania said in the ongoing judgement that there was nowhere in law where INEC was only required to transmit results by electronic means.

The defendant (IÑEC) is at liberty to decide how it would transmit election results.

The court also held that it was irrelevant that President Bola Tinubu failed to score 25 per cent of the votes cast in at least two-thirds of the states of the federation, and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

Peter Obi and the Labour Party prayed the court to declare him as the candidate that secured the majority of the lawful votes cast with the required constitutional spread of not less than 25 per cent of the votes cast in at least two-thirds of the states of the federation, and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

But in its ruling on Wednesday, the court held that FCT 25 per cent was irrelevant, agreeing with the argument of the respondent that “the FCT does not enjoy a special status, that Abuja is inhabited by Nigerians and that Abuja does not enjoy any special privilege.”

It also said that Labour party in it's petition fails to specify alleged electoral malpractices during the conduct of 2023 presidential election.