BY : AYO ESAN
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said that the confession by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) that its card readers were being circumvented, confirms its position that the Kogi and Bayelsa governorship elections, as well as the Kogi West Senatorial election, were all manipulated and therefore fraudulent.
The party in a release issued Thursday and signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr Kola Ologbondiyan said the confession by two INEC commissioners; Festus Okoye and Haruna Mohammed on Wednesday, that the card readers were circumvented in elections conducted by the commission did not come to it as a surprise.
The PDP said it had always held that no matter how much falsehood appears to thrive, the truth will always catch up with it.
” The confession by the commission vindicates the position of the PDP and majority of Nigerians that there were manipulations, alterations and circumventing of genuine data captured by the card readers and that actual results transmitted from polling units were tampered with.
“The admission also brings to light why INEC had no convincing defence at the tribunal in the face of overwhelming discrepancies in the figures it declared in the Presidential poll.
“It is instructive to note that the confession by INEC has not only vindicated our party, it has placed a huge burden on the Chairman of INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu.
“It is indeed unfortunate that INEC can suddenly claim that it has just realized that the card readers have lost steam in our electoral process after they have been used to manipulate voting processes.
“Prof. Yakubu is now faced with the burden of how our electoral system has been corrupted by the manipulations in his INEC, all in the bid to serve group, rather than national interest.
” The INEC Chairman should accept his failures and vacate office without further delay. This is because there is no way Nigerians can continue to repose confidence in the commission under his watch.
“Of course, not under an electoral commission that condones the invasion of polling units, suppression of voters and stuffing of snatched ballot boxes; an INEC that cancels results in places where election held peacefully while announcing fabricated results allocated to its favored political party as valid votes”.
The PDP said it totally rejects attempts by INEC to shift the blames for its failures to other political parties.
” It is on record that our party had consistently pointed to infractions created and allowed by INEC to facilitate rigging in elections”, PDP said.
While calling on Nigerians to remain calm, the PDP charges Prof. Yakubu and the INEC leadership under him to do the needful by vacating offices to save our electoral system from complete collapse.
