Ogun: PDP’s star witness presents controversial electronic ‘evidence’

By Musa Baba Adamu

In continuation of the proceedings at the governorship election petition tribunal sitting in Abeokuta metropolis, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Wednesday called it’s star witness, who came with some downloaded electronic materials.
The star witness, Oyejide Sunkanmi, appeared before the panel with electronic evidence which purported to show alleged disruption of electoral process as claimed by PDP earlier, as well as printed materials presumed to have contained evidence of crime committed in Florida by Governor Dapo Abiodun and attendant jail term.
In their reactions, Counsel to Respondents raised strong objections on the originality and authenticity of the electronic materials, particularly the purported video, presented by the PDP’s star witness as evidence.
They queried the materials on the ground that in the first instance, the star witness admitted in his written statement that he was not the originator of the materials, rather, the purported evidence was downloaded. They argued that a video that was captured by someone else could not be tendered by the star witness, as to do so would be to accept inadmissible hearsay evidence.
Respondents counsel further argued that the authenticity of any document being tendered must be established , which was the essence of the legal requirement that such documents must be covered by a certificate of compliance.
The respective Counsel added that at no time were downloaded evidences being considered and acceptable in the court of law, and that in this instance the video was not pleaded or listed and that the transcript of the video which the witness had attached to his Certificate of Compliance was not even mentioned at all in the witness’ statement on oath. This was even as the Counsel to Petitioners assiduously encouraged the tribunal to accept the materials as evidence.
At the end of the day, the letter written by the PDP and the witness’ voters card was admitted as an exhibit of the Court.
With respect to the pictures tendered, top up cards, and Florida Metropolitan Police Jail Incident Record, the Tribunal marked them with Exhibit Numbers while Respondents’ counsel reserved their objections for the final address stage, as had been the case for other contentious documents.
Ruling on the admissibility of the video was reserved to be delivered on Thursday.