By Chibuike Nwabuko
Abuja (Sundiata Post) – President Muhammadu Buhari and the All Progressives Congress on Thursday closed their defence in the petition filed by the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.
The PDP and Atiku are by their petition challenging the victory of Buhari and the APC in the February 23, 2019 poll.
Buhari who opened his defence at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal on Tuesday, had called seven witnesses between then and Wednesday.
He was to continue his defence on Thursday.
But shortly after the matter was called on Wednesday, the President’s lawyer, Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), announced to the five-man tribunal led by Justice Mohammed Garba that his team was satisfied with the seven witnesses they had led.
When the tribunal sought the reaction of the APC’s lawyer, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), whom it was his turn to open his client’s defence, he said he and members of his team also found it unnecessary to call any witness.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) which is the first respondent did not also call any witness or tender any document.
In all, there were seven defence witnesses against the 62 called by the petitioners.
Recall that the INEC chairman Mahmood Yakubu said Buhari polled 15,191,847 votes to defeat Atiku, who polled 11,262,978 votes.
However, Atiku and the PDP said the election was massively rigged.
They contended that the data obtained from INEC’s server, the true, actual and correct results” showed that they polled a total of 18,356,732 votes to defeat Buhari whom they said scored 16,741,430 votes.
The election tribunal fixed August 21 for final arguments in the petition filed by the PDP and Atiku.
During the tribunal, INEC said that it had no server where the election results were transmitted during the February 23 presidential election.
The PDP had presented over five witnesses to attest to its claims of compromise in the presidential election result.