Court grants INEC request to reconfigure BVAS

INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu

Tinubu gets court order to inspect election materials

The Appeal Court in Abuja on Wednesday granted the request of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to reconfigure the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) used for the February 25 presidential election.

The panel also granted an application by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and President-elect, Bola Tinubu, access to inspect sensitive materials used for the presidential election to enable him and the party defend the petitions filed against them.

A three-member panel of justices led by Justice Joseph Ikyegh ruled that the reconfiguration was to enable the commission to conduct the March 11 governorship and state assembly elections.

The ruling was in an application by the Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate, Peter Obi, seeking access to inspect and certify sensitive materials used for the conduct of the election.

The panel turned down the application to stop INEC from reconfiguring the BVAS.

The panel said INEC’s submission that the accreditation data from the 176,000 BVAS used for the election would be uploaded and stored in the backend of the server was not challenged or controverted by Obi and the LP and thus they were deemed admitted.