The independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has approached the court of appeal in Abuja, requesting it to modify the directive issued to the Labour Party and People Democratic Party presidential candidates, Peter Obi and Atiku Abubakar, allowing them to inspect all electoral materials used for the presidential elections.
Recall, this order was approved last friday by the Court led by Justice Joseph Ikyegh after listening to the two separate applications filed by the presidential candidates alongside their political parties.
Cited as Respondents in the matter were INEC, the winner of the presidential election, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, as well as, the All Progressives Congress, APC.
INEC, urged the appellate court, which will sit at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal, to vary the order to enable it to reconfigure the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, it used for the presidential poll on February 25. According to Vanguard news, INEC said this in its legal process dated March 4,
It told the court that the configuration was necessary since the BVAS would also be deployed for the next round of elections, starting with Governorship and State Assembly elections billed for Saturday, as well as other rescheduled elections.
According to the INEC, without a prompt variation of the inspection order granted to Mr. Peter Obi of the LP and Alhaji Atiku Abubakar of the PDP, especially the aspect restraining it from tampering with information contained in the BVAS, it would be difficult for it to proceed with the scheduled elections.
