Abuja — The ANPP presidential candidate in the April 2007 polls, General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), said yesterday in Abuja that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) forged the 2007 presidential election results.

Buhari, who is challenging the declaration of President Umaru Yar'Adua as winner by INEC at the presidential election tribunal, called for the nullification of the election.

His position was contained in a final address submitted on his behalf by his lead counsel, Chief Mike Ahamba (SAN), before the Presidential Election Tribunal sitting in Abuja.

A copy of the address which was made available to LEADERSHIP last night show that Buhari wants the court to hold that the conditions under Section 146 (1) of the Electoral Act 2006 have been held and, having so held, it should nullify the presidential election conducted by INEC and its chairman, Prof. Maurice Iwu.

Specifically, the petitioner alleged that there was no election in 29 states covered by his evidence and address to the tribunal.

He contended that the results in INEC's Forms EC8(A) and EC8E (the presidential election results sheets from the states and the final results) were arbitrarily assigned without any election at the base.

He said that the results were arbitrarily awarded in favour of the PDP, Yar'Adua and Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan.

"We have proved bias in INEC, acting through its staff and agents, by showing that wherever anything was done wrong, it was done in favour of the declared winners," he said.

"We have proved that the voters' register was so irregular that even photos of children featured in many, and that some were in foolscap sheets," he added.

The petitioner said that he submitted evidence before the tribunal to the effect that results of the poll were being written on different days, including before and after "the so called result" had been announced.

He alleged that the poll results from the states were in existence even before the date of the election.

"Then it will take minimal objectivity to come to a conclusion that the final result was arbitrarily put together," he said.

Buhari said he had proved beyond doubt allegations of widespread illegalities and improprieties during the election and that neither INEC nor the declared winners failed to provide answers.

He said: "With the overwhelming evidence of non-compliance with the several safeguard sections of the Electoral Act 2006 by INEC and Iwu, it is submitted that the election was so badly conducted."

Buhari and his Action Congress counterpart, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, want the court to nullify the election on the grounds that it was massively rigged.

In a related development, President Yar'Adua said yesterday that the attempt by Alhaji Atiku Abubakar to discredit Prof. Maurice Iwu's reply to his interrogatories has further shown the feebleness of his petition.

Relying on points of law to the AC candidate's address, the President, through his counsel, Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN, said the allegation of perjury against Iwu was evidence that the petition was misconceived, adding that the petitioner was a drowning man looking for a straw.

According to him, "they (Atiku and other petitioners) seem to be under the wrong impression that having not proved anything in evidence in the petition, the answers to the interrogatories will constitute the talisman for proving their very feeble case."

But he said this has failed because his claim that the INEC chairman lied about the award of contracts for the voters' card for the presidential election was based on the misunderstanding of the law.

Yar'Adua said the INEC chairman could not, in the absence of a court order, be said to have perjured, adding that the basis of the allegation was the petitioner's pleading and an inadmissible exhibit.

He said the exhibit, a newspaper interview granted by the chairman, was "a loose sheet of a newspaper, which by every intent and purpose is not admissible in law."

He stated, "Pleadings do not constitute evidence," adding that whatever weakness Iwu's reply to the interrogatories might have, it could only damage Atiku's petition, since it was part of his case.

The President said the petitioner's effort to discredit INEC chairman's reply to the interrogatories with the official report of the commission issued last year was an exercise in futility because it misconceived both the facts and law.

He said, "With the greatest respect to the petitioners' counsel, their submission on the interrogatories is a complete departure from the simple question put in their question number 1, to wit, whether a fresh contract for printing of ballot papers for the presidential election was awarded less than five days to the election, a question which was followed by question number 2 as to whether the said contract was awarded to a company in South Africa.

"None of the questions relates to where ballot papers were printed. There is a world of difference between mere award of contracts and where ballot papers were printed. Petitioners' counsel have now shifted ground from the simple questions they asked relating to award of contract to printing of ballot papers in their address.

"With respect again, they have created a confusing situation and unfairly shifted blame to the 5th Respondent (INEC) who has merely answered the simple questions put to him. Put bluntly, nothing in the neighbourhood of perjury has been committed by the 5th Respondent (INEC)."

He argued further that the INEC official report could not help the case of the petitioner because it was neither pleaded nor was it admissible since it was not gazetted.

On the issue of exclusion of Atiku from the election, Yar'Adua said the AC candidate's disagreement with the interrogatories was a further proof that "the entire petition is a non-starter, a paradox of a sort and represents a clear situation where a party takes himself at cross- purposes."

His reason: "Any petitioner who claims exclusion under Section 145 (1) (d) of the Electoral Act cannot reasonably, logically, legally and bona fide administer interrogatories in respect of the same election for which he is alleging total exclusion," since under the said section, which the petitioner has based his case, the issue could not be a haphazard affair.

According to the President, "Naturally, no human being can be half present in a place and half absent. One is either present or absent. For the petitioners, they are either excluded or included and if they are excluded, they cannot have an alternative prayer for non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act, 2006."