Politics
THE Atiku/Okowa Campaign Organisation has asked the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to cancel all collated results so far and declare the election inconclusive.
A spokesman for the campaign, Daniel Bwala disclosed this in a statement on Tuesday.
He alleged that the election has been marred by irregularities, describing it as a “total departure from the Electoral Act Amendment”.
“Section 65 of the Electoral Act mandates the INEC chairman to correct every anomaly (s) raised by stakeholders of the process (political party and their agents) within 7 days,” the statement partly read.
Bwala asked the INEC chairman, Mahmood Yakubu to:
“Suspend national collation immediately and address the complaints raised by parties relating to BVAS bypass and electronic transmission of results.
“Set a date for the conduct of elections in the affected places and ensure results are uploaded as contained in the guidelines. The said elections must be free and fair and BVAS used accordingly
“Cancel all the collated and announced results so far until such a time when all the results collated at the polling units alone be uploaded to INEC server, same ONLY NE ANNOUNCED, duplicate copies of which all party agents have for transparency sake.
“Declare this election inconclusive and set a date for conduct of elections that addresses areas where BVAS was not used and where violence occurred which suppress the voting rights of the people.”
Drama At Collation Centre
Channels Television had reported that two agents of the flag bearer of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, stormed out of the National Collation Centre for the presidential election results at the International Conference Centre in Abuja on Monday.
A member of the 8th National Assembly from Kogi West Senatorial District, Dino Melaye; and a former governor of Imo State, Emeka Ihedioha; an agent of the Labour Party, amongst others staged a walkout on the INEC chairman over dissatisfaction on the process of the collation of results from state collation officers for the presidential election (SCOPs).
The drama ensued around 4:30pm on Monday at the resumed collation exercise of the February 25 presidential election results for the second day.
Melaye, Ihedioha, as well as the agents of the Labour Party and others, had complained that the results presented by INEC SCOPs weren’t uploaded on the commission’s Results Viewing Portal (IReV), as repeatedly promised by the electoral umpire before the February 25 presidential poll.
Melaye argued strongly that without the upload of results electronically on IReV, this year’s election is not in any way different from the manual transmission of results done in 2015.
Melaye and others fiercely insisted that the INEC Chairman must not accept the results of Ekiti, alleging that there were incidents of over voting and electoral irregularities. They contended that the collation of results at the centre is at variance with provisions of the Electoral Act 2022 and that they do not believe in the results presented by the SCOPs.
However, the INEC chairman maintained that there was no over voting in Ekiti and that the results presented by the SCOPs stand. Yakubu also said the process must continue.
In reaction, Melaye, Ihedioha and others stormed out of the national collation centre.
Before the break on Tuesday, Mahmood had cautioned Melaye not to be “disruptive” of the collation process at the insistence of the PDP chieftain that the results announced by the SCOPs should first have been uploaded on IReV for transparency and accountability.
The collation for Day 2 continued in their absence.
Already, results have been released for about 13 states with the top parties sharing the wins.
Many party leaders have bitterly complained that INEC officials at the polling units were unable to upload election results to the IReV. The IReV and the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) are new technologies introduced by the electoral body for the accreditation and electronic transmission of votes for this year’s polls.
Elections for the office of the President, 360 House of Representatives and 109 Senatorial seats were held in the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory on Saturday and Nigerians expect the declaration of results by the electoral umpire.
–(Culled from Channels)
KN
Tags: Atiku Abubakar Daniel Bwala INEC Mahmood Yakubu
