How the Appeal Court Ruled In Favour of Aregbesola

The court sat at exactly 9.00 am. Case called and appearance to be announced. I’ll update as it goes on if the blocker does not work. The court held that the evidence of the appellant’s witnesses ought not to be treated as mere allegations requiring further proof beyond reasonable doubt. The tribunal was held in error to have treated the testimonies of the witnesses front loaded and adopted in court to be mere allegations.
The counsel to the respondents also conceded that the reference by the tribunal to the evidence of the appellants as mere allegations by referring to the erroneous position of the tribunal as mere slip. It is not a mere slip but an irregularity of a substantial nature which has occasioned a miscarriage of justice.
The cross-appeal filed by Yusuf Ali on behalf of Oyinlola challenging the nullification by the Tribunal of the results of two polling units was and asking the court to reject the conclusion of the Tribunal that the evidence of Oyinlola’s experts be upheld, was dismissed for lacking in merit.
Allegations of non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act by the Appellants are purely civil and not criminal and need not be proved beyond reasonable doubt. Thus all the allegations of the Appellants are not criminal in nature but rather civil and need only be proved on the balance of probabilities. The tribunal was completely erroneous in holding that the petition only alleges crimes and should be proved beyond reasonable doubt.
Ward supervisors called as witnesses by the Appellants are competent witnesses contrary to the holding of the tribunal. The evidence of the witnesses is direct and assuming they were illegally present at the polling units which is not so in the case, the illegality only attaches to their persons and not to the evidence given by them. The position of the tribunal that evidence of non-counting of votes could only come from polling agents is clearly erroneous.
The reports of polling agents tendered by appellants’ witnesses cannot be called hearsay. The admissibility of the reports should be based on the provisions of section 91 of the Evidence Act which allows such reports where undue delay would be occasioned if the makers of the reports were to be called personally to give evidence. The decision of the tribunal that the reports of the Polling agents were of no value is clearly erroneous. To hold otherwise would render the provisions of section 91 of the Evidence Act dead letter.
Polling agents are mere representatives of the party whose reports are the reports of the political party that appointed them. The principle of agency as contained in the Latin maxim, qui facit per alium facit per se, i.e. “he who does an act through an agent does it by himself” is directly applicable to the present case. The argument of the respondents in this regard is nothing but mere afterthought. The failure to attach weight to the evidence contained in the reports of polling agents resulted into clear miscarriage of justice and clear misconception of the law.
Failure of respondents to call evidence Failure of INEC and the police to call witnesses amounts to abandonment of their cases. The petitioner led both oral and documentary evidence to prove his allegations against which INEC and the police did not call any evidence. Mere cross-examination of the petitioners’ witnesses would not suffice. Most of the petitioners’ witnesses were not cross-examined by the respondents and where they were cross-examined, their evidence was not challenged. The case of the respondents are hereby deemed abandoned.
Whether the tribunals properly evaluated the evidence before it The tribunal did not properly evaluate the evidence of the appellants as the evidence of the witnesses were characterized in most cases as mere allegations by the tribunal and did not properly consider the probative value of the appellants. The court held that the tribunal went about it’s duty in a shoddy and sloppy manner as it failed to evaluate the evidence of the appellant vis a vis that of the respondents as to establish the inconsistencies in the case of the respondents witnesses who were confronted with documents showing that they were lying.
Certified true copies of results produced by INEC were blank. Yet, the tribunal did not observe this point. The tribunal grossly erred as it would appear that it equated a witness’s evidence to mere pleading. The tribunal abdicated its duty of evaluation of evidence. The tribunal rejected the evidence of the appellants on wrong premise. The evaluation of the evidence of the petitioners’ experts by the tribunal is a travesty. PW80 was admitted by the tribunal as an expert it rather abdicated its duty. The evidence of PW 80, Paul Jobbins, was not discredited in cross-examination. The evidence of Tunde Yadeka, PW 82, is clearly that of an expert which was not discredited in cross-examination. The tribunal took a jaundiced position on the evidence of this witness.
The appellants have proved the allegations of irregularities and non-probabilities in the ten local governments. The results of the said ten local governments are hereby nullified. The appellants are hereby declared winner by 198,799 The respondents had 172,880 and lost the election.
The court hereby orders that the petitioner be sworn in as the winner of the 2007 gubernatorial election in Osun State. While the judgment was started at 9.30 am, it was concluded at 2.13 pm
Kunle Adegoke Solicitor & Advocate of the Supreme Court of Nigeria 08023337003
Compiled by Lateef Raji