2019 Elections: PDP, Atiku head to S’Court over bid to inspect INEC’s server

The Presidential Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Abuja, on Monday, dismissed an application the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and its candidate, Atiku Abubakar, filed to be granted access to inspect the central server they said was used by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to transmit results of the February 23 presidential election.

The tribunal, in a unanimous decision by a five-member panel of Justices, said the request could not be granted since the issue of whether such central server existed or not, is already a subject of controversy in the substantive petition that is challenging President Muhammadu Buhari’s re-election. ADVERTISING It stressed that the fact that all the parties to the petition have joined issues on whether or not the said server was used for the collation and transmission of results of the election, granting the joint application by PDP and Atiku, would amount to delving into the main case.

According to the tribunal, allowing the application would amount to prejudging of “fundamental issues already raised by the parties on the substantive matter”. Besides, Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Mohammed Garba who delivered the lead ruling, held that the Supreme Court had on plethora of decided cases, warned that issue that formed the crux of a dispute before any court should not be determined at the interlocutory stage. He held that the law bestowed the tribunal with discretionary powers to grant or refuse the application, saying “the court will be willing to exercise its discretion in favour of the Applicant, where there are reasons to do so. “Such discretion must be properly exercised, judiciously and judicially.

It follows therefore that the exercise of discretion is one of the strongest weapons of the court of law which must not be exercised in vacuum”, Justice Garba added. The tribunal observed that whereas the petitioners maintained that results of the election were indeed collated and transmitted to a central server, on the other hand, INEC, said it was not in possession or aware of the existence of such server.