Index to Nigerian Newspapers

Obi urged the court to hold that the petitioners, who claimed to have won in 13 states including Rivers, Benue, and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), were the winners of the election. They claimed that INEC mischievously downloaded 18,088 blurred polling unit results, including blank A4 papers and photographs of unknown persons, in place of the presidential results. The results were obtained from 168 local government areas in 14 states of the federation. Obi argued that the non-compliance with relevant laws by INEC during the election significantly affected the result. He stated that the certified copies of the election results showed that the purported Forms EC8As in several polling units were affected by mutilations, cancellations, alterations, and outright swapping of votes in favor of President Tinubu and the APC. The respondents' reply to the petition was that the refusal to comply with the specific requirement of the law to upload/transmit election results using the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS) from the Commission.