By: Valentine Adese (JP),
The National/State Houses of Assembly Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Jos, Plateau State has been urged to declare, Amb. Chris Giwa, as the authentic winner of the Plateau Northern Senatorial election and not, Sen. Simon Mwadkwon.
A Statistician, Mr. Gabriel Pam Dagyet, who is one of the Petitioners’ witness, told the Tribunal under Cross Examination that Amb. Chris had 3400 as Margin of Lead after inspecting election materials.
Dagyet added that, out of the 2255 polling unit results, BVAS and INEC materials inspected and analyzed, 1043 forms EC8A1 series were mutilated.
He also disclosed to the Tribunal that he was not paid to urge the Tribunal but his honest position after analyzing the available data.
Dagyet explained that, his analysis did not cover the entire senatorial zone, but a cluster, which are areas of interest.
Mr. Pam Dagyet told the Tribunal in part, during Exanination-in Chief and Cross-examinations by the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Respondents’ Counsels.
“I am Gabriel Pam Dagyet. I have made my statement, dated 2nd May, 2023 on Oath and it is before the Tribunal. I adopt it as my evidence in this Petition.
“I signed my statement, as a Statistician Analyst (SA). I live in Plateau State. I am a Statistician with the University of Jos and also a Consultant.
“I have gone through the Voter Registers and the BVAS. I have compared the data in some 2255 polling units in Jos North Local Government Area (LGA). Out of the 2255 polling units, 1043 were found to have different levels of non-compliance. I cannot list them off hand now, but they are contained in a report before the Tribunal.
“I conducted inspection on the materials and I know something with respect to the election because I voted so, I can not only speak on the inspection of materials. Apart from my polling unit, I did not visit any other one during the election.
“I am not an official of INEC and I do not have any reason to participate in accreditation or compilation of results in any polling unit.
“I did not read the petition in this case because, I am not a Lawyer and I did not read the replies also.
“In my statement on Oath, I did not state my place of work or my employer. I did not also state the certificates I obtained as a Statistician.
“In my paragraph one, I stated that, we worked as a team and in paragraph 2, I made compariim with the BVAS report at the point of inspection. I did not request for the Certified True Copies (CTC) of the BVAS report, but I did requested, for the CTC of the EC8A1 series and I am of the knowledge that they have been tendered.
“I carried out the inspection of electoral materials with the Petitioners’ Counsel, but I cannot remember the date. I never referred to any date in my statement that the inspection took place.
“In Paragraph 3 of my statement, I also identified mutilated forms, but I did not list them in my statement.
“In paragraph 4, I stated that, I confirmed illegal votes, but I did not state them in my statement. However, they are contained in my report tendered in the Tribunal.
“In my paragraph 5, I stated that, I found that the Petitioners have Margin of Lead of 2400 in my report and not in my statement.
“It is true that Statisticians deal with figures. In my paragraph 6, I stated that, the 1st Petitioner, being the person with the highest lawful votes should be declared winner. However, the figures that constitute the lawful votes is not contained in my statement.
“All through my statement, I never disclosed that, I prepared a report on account of the inspection of the election materials in my statement.
“I did not attach the report of the statistical analysis to my statement that I adopted today. I did not also mention the number of polling units with observed non-compliance in my witness statement.
“I was paid as a Consultant to do the inspection job. I was not paid to urge the Tribunal to grant the reliefs in this petition. It was simply based on my statistical analysis.
“As a statistician, who analyses figures, when a job is given, we don’t select areas. Rather, you analyze area of interest. I therefore did not analyze all the results in the senatorial zone but clusters. I abide by my paragraph 6”.
However, before Mr. Dagyet was called to the witness box, the Petitioners’ Counsel, I. H. Magaji (SAN), had called one Sanni Paul Zaruma, the Jos North Secretary of the APC, who is a Legal Practitioner and a member of the APC legal team.
Zaruma told the Tribunal that he wants his party and its senatorial candidate to win judiciously.
READ HIS TESTIMONY UNDER EXAMINATION-IN-CHIEF AND DURING CROSS-EXAMINATION BY THE 3 RESPONDENT COUNSELS IN PART BELOW:
“I am 42 years old. I live in Jos North Local Government Area (LGA) of Plateau State. I reside at plot T15 Zaruma Close Farin Gada. I have filed my statement on oath, dated 2nd May, 2023, before the Tribunal. I can identify it by my signature. I want the Tribunal to take it as my evidence in this petition.
“I am a private legal practitioner and more into Human Rights defense.
“In paragraphs 3 and 4 of my statement, I stated that, we applied for the various result sheets and I did that as APC secretary, Jos-North LGA. This is because we have the express mandate of the party to do so. I said we because we worked as a team. I am a member of APC Legal Committee and this is just a part of our terms of reference.
“At the first instance, we got a written mandate but as things went on, we had an oral mandate. Sorry, I am not with the written mandate here.
“I did not read the complete petition but just a part and I have not read the reply of the 2nd Respondent. I cannot remember if I had forgotten anything of importance regarding the petition in my statement on Oath.
“In paragraph one of my statement, I stated that, I was one of the people commissioned to prosecute and inspect election materials in relation to this petition and I have been trained on how to conduct inspection of election materials. I cannot remember the date we carried out this exercise.
“I did not personally sign any application or letter for the inspection of materials of the CTCs to INEC as stated in my statement.
“In paragraph 3 of the statement I adopted, I stated that we applied and obtained CTCs of Judgments. I have therefore seen a case of PDP. However, a copy is not handy, but I read the case.
“As a party man and a Lawyer, I am just hearing that, the Federal and Appeal Courts have confirmed that PDP conducted State Congress on 25th Sept. 2021.
“We did apply for polling unit booklets.
‘I am not a member of PDP and I shall never be one. The first Petitioner, Amb. Chris Giwa is also not a member.
“I have read the PDP’s Constitution but not to the extent of being familiar and I am not aware that it is the NWC of the PDP that organizes primaries for all national elections.
“The 1st Petitioner did not participate in PDP’s primary election.
“One of the grounds of this petition is the non-compliance to the electoral Act.
“We are also asking the Tribunal to declare our candidate as the winner of the Senatorial election on the basis that the Courts have delivered judgments that PDP does not have structure in Plateau state.
“In our claim, we did not mention the result as our base and my desire is that my party wins judiciously.
‘All the paragraphs flow together and they have link with the petition.
“The mutilated form EC8A1 series affected the election”.
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