Kaduna governorship: Tribunal admits BVAS machines as exhibits

About 316 Bimodal Voters’ Accreditation System (BVAS) machines were presented and admitted as exhibits at the ongoing sitting of the governorship election petition tribunal on Tuesday in Kaduna.

The BVAS machines were admitted as exhibits based on the subpoena served on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to bring before the court the said items as applied by the 1st and 2nd petitioners, Isa Ashiru and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) through their counsel, Samuel Atung (SAN).

Yusuf Zubairu, who was at the court on behalf of the Commission (INEC) made a written statement on oath before the registrar of the tribunal on the 25th day of July, 2023, to present BVAS machines of 19 Local Government Areas of the state.

In his deposition before the court, the Commission was subpoenaed to demonstrate how the machines were used to collate election results in the state at the last gubernatorial poll.

Zubairu, who is a staff of INEC at the ICT/ Voters’ Research Department, testified that the results on the Irev was the true reflection of the votes cast during the 18th March, 2023, gubernatorial election in the State.

The INEC staff added that the BVAS machines cannot be tampered with, either before, during or after the election, just as he explained to the court that each machine has its unique identity numbers.

The witness, while demonstrating, using one of the machines, told the tribunal that polling unit 050 of Makera ward in Kaduna South LGA had 715 total registered voters but only 107 voters were accredited for the election.

Earlier before the tribunal granted the application of the 1st and 2nd petitioners’ counsel, Chief Duro Adeyele (SAN) who is the counsel to the Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani, objected to the admissibility of the BVAS machines through the witness.

The counsel also argued that the witness’ deposition did not state that the witness (Yusuf Zubairu) would open and demonstrate the BVAS machine before the tribunal, saying, “demonstration of BVAS’ machine is not in the witness’ statement.”

In his counter argument, Ashiru and PDP’s counsel explained that the Commission was subpoenaed to tender and demonstrate the machine before the court.

The court adjourned the case to Wednesday, 26th July, 2023, for the continuation of hearing