Iwu’s Interrogation: Atiku has lost his case - Yar’Adua

Lanre Adewole, Abuja - 01.02.2008

PRESIDENT Umaru Yar’Adua and his deputy, Goodluck Jonathan, on Wednesday said that the Action Congress’s candidate in the 2007 presidential election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, had bungled his case over the April 21 presidential election by electing to interrogate the Chairman of the Indepedent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Maurice Iwu.

The duo stated that Atiku messed his case at the presidential election petition tribunal by posing those 27 questions to Iwu, whose response, they said, had shown that Atiku had no case to prove again.

In a written address submitted on behalf of the president by Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), the president claimed that the answers provided by Iwu had strengthened his case and weakened that of Abubakar.

The president stated that since INEC awarded all the contracts for the printing of ballot papers for the 2007 general election to Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company the questions on whether the same contracts were awarded to a South African company did not arise.

The President said, “Questions 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 and 10 are based on the wrong assumption by the petitioners that the contract for the printing of ballot papers was awarded to a South African company and since it has been clearly stated in the answer to question 1 that it was the Nigerian Security and Minting Company, that handled all contracts for the co-ordination and printing of the ballot papers, the said questions 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 and 10 become totally irrelevant, as borne out by the answers provided.”

Yar’Adua stated that since Iwu had shown in his answers that Abubakar’s name was displayed as one of the presidential candidates he could no longer sustain the allegation that he was excluded from the election.

“The answers to questions 17, 18, 19 and 20 clearly show that the 1st petitioner’s (Abubakar’s) name was published by INEC as one of the candidates contesting the election and that the public was adequately informed.

“These answers deal deadly blow to the unsubstantiated claim by the 1st petitioner that he was excluded from election. “On his own request, a list showing his name among other candidates who contested the presidential election has now been attached.

“He cannot be heard again to assert anything to the contrary.” The president stated that Abubakar should not be allowed to attack or dispute the questions elicited by him on oath through his interrogatories.

Both Atiku and Senator Ben Obi, his running mate, President Yar’Adua said, “chose to doggedly and strangely request for interrogatories and since the answers have become part of the record and, indeed, their evidence, they can not shy away from them.

“It is granted that a defendant is a competent and compellable witness for the plaintiff and vice versa. Howbeit, any party who chooses or gambles to call his opponent or adversary as a witness would also have to inherit the advantages or even liabilities of the evidence of such witness.

“Put succinctly and within the precincts of this case, the answers submitted through the interrogatories on oath constitute an admission against the interest of the petitioners and such an admission is binding on them.”