The Labour Party and its governorship candidate in Enugu state, Chijioke Edeoga, are at odds over whether the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Enugu state, Dr. Chukwuemeka Chukwu, will appear at the Tribunal on Sunday with the Bimodal Voter’s Accreditation System, BVAS, used for the governorship election in the state on March 18, 2023.
There has been a dispute over the service of a subpoena on INEC to make BVAS available to the Labour Party, which INEC has not done despite a subpoena on the REC to have all LP inspect the BVAS.
On Saturday, the Tribunal began its hearing, and arguments were heard on the legal perspectives on legitimate procedures of serving subpoenas, citing Supreme Court decisions. However, the Tribunal Chairman, Kudirat Akano, decided in favor of a substituted service on INEC through its counsel, Okoye.
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Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN), Anthony Ani (SAN), Ikechukwu Oluoma, and others represented the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and its candidate, Peter Mbah.
After taking some witnesses, Labour Party counsel lead by Valerie Azinge raised the matter of the alleged subpoena given on the REC to deliver the BVAS machine.
The INEC lawyers, on the other hand, claimed that the subpoena was not served on the REC but on his attorney, notwithstanding a Supreme Court judgment that it should be served on the REC directly. The court upheld the PDP submission, but the LP’s counsel filed a new application for substituted service on the subpoena since the previously served subpoena was returned incorrectly.
The Tribunal granted a substituted service to one of the INEC counsels inside the court, via counsel Okoye. It had been served.
The last day for the LP to present its case is Sunday, and the party is awaiting the Tribunal’s ruling on the INEC Subpoena deadlock.
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The All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA, and its governorship candidate, Mr. Frank Nweke jnr, were also heard and delayed until Sunday.
When the tribunal delayed things on Saturday evening and Sunday morning, there were concerns about how the subpoena would reach the INEC.
“Having serviced the INEC council, it means that the REC has been served with the subpoena, but what will happen with the subpoena is now what we will see tomorrow (Sunday) because if tomorrow is Saturday and tomorrow is Sunday and the INEC counsel has not said that the subpoena has gotten to the REC, we really don’t know what will happen tomorrow (Sunday), but the purport of the subpoena is to bring the BVAS machine and give evidence,” PDP counsel Uloma said.
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