The defense team for Tinubu explains why copies of the PEPT ruling have a watermark

The Presidential Elections Petition Tribunal (PEPT) judgment copies that the Tinubu Presidential Legal Team (TPLT) watermarked have been the subject of some debate.

The watermarked copy has sparked discussion on social media, with some people accusing the author of a sneaky maneuver.

In response, however, TPLT coordinator Babatunde Ogala said in a statement on Saturday that they watermarked their copy of the decision after receiving it from the Court of Appeal before sending the scanned copies to members of their team.

The statement reads in part: “After the delivery of judgement in the three election petitions by the Court of Appeal on September 6, 2023, the Court directed its registry to make physical copies of same available on September 7, 2023.

“Accordingly, the Tinubu Presidential Legal Team applied for a Certified True Copy of the said judgement and paid the prescribed fee.

“In fact, the representative of the PDP collected the first copy that was made available by the registry.

“On collecting our own copy, we immediately scanned and watermarked it with the inscription “Tinubu Presidential Legal Team ‘TPLT’” before circulating the scanned soft copies to the lawyers in our team.

“The Certified True Copy issued to us and other parties in the petitions by the registry does not contain the said inscription, and any insinuation to the contrary is untrue.

“Counsel for the petitioners will also appreciate the fact that the insinuations being circulated in some quarters are untrue, unkind, unfair, and unfortunate, as they have the same certified copies of the judgement as we have.”

PEPT confirmed President Bola Tinubu’s win in the general election of 2023 earlier this week.

Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) and Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) have already traveled to the Supreme Court to challenge the decision.