The three governorship candidates of PDP, APC and LP, Tony Nwoye, Chris Ngige and Ifeanyi Ubah vowed on Saturday November 16, 2013 night to reject whatever result that would be announced by INEC from Saturday and proposed Sunday gubernatorial elections in Anambra State, Nigeria.
At a joint news conference addressed at 8:00 p.m. at Finotel Hotel, Awka, Senator Ngige presented the official position of the three contestants on the election. The three candidates had earlier in the day expressed their dissatisfaction with the conduct of the election.
Senator Chris Ngige said: “Our stand is that Saturday election was characterized by fraud, malpractices and massive irregularities and we call on INEC to put in place another process to conduct a fresh election to enable the people of Anambra elect their governor that will take over from the present governor on March 17 next year. The irregularities clearly noticed included the omission of the names of many voters in the registers presented for the election in the over 4,000 polling units.”
Continuing, Senator Ngige said: “We were assured that the process will be free and fair during the stake holder’s meeting with the INEC Chairman, Prof Attahiru Jega, but little did we know that they had planned to disenfranchise many of our supporters by deleting their names from the register everywhere in the local government areas. It was so massive and we hereby reject the voters registers used for this election. We were assured by the INEC chairman that the electoral process would be transparent but we experienced was the contrary.”
INEC Declares Anambra Guber Poll Inconclusive
THE Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) has declared Saturday’s governorship election in Anambra State inconclusive. To this end, a supplementary election is to held in the state before a winner is eventually declared.
The Returning Officer , James Okueke, who released results for the 21 councils of the state, said the front runner and candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Willy Obiano could not be pronounced outright winner as the margin between him the first runner-up, Tony Nwoye of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), was less than the total number of registered voters in the areas where voting never took place on Saturday.
According to available results, APGA polled 174,710 votes, PDP has 94,956 votes, APC 92,300 votes and Labour Party 37,446 votes to emerge first, second, third and fourth positions in that order. According to Okueke, a total of 429,554 votes were cast, out of which 113,013 ballots were rejected, noting that the margin between the APGA and PDP candidates was 79,774 votes, thereby making it impossible for anyone to be declared winner at this stage pending when supplementary election holds in the affected wards and units across the state .
Meanwhile, Ubah (LP), Ngige (APC) and Nwoye (PDP) have reiterated calls for the outright cancellation of the entire exercise, alleging gross electoral irregularities and inducement of voters on the election day. They are also asking for the sack of the state’s Resident Electoral Commissioner, Prof. Chukwuemeka Onukaogu.
You Do Not Need Court Order to cancel Anambra Polls – APC Tells INEC Chairman Jega
Meanwhile, the Interim National Publicity Secretary of APC, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, reminded INEC Chairman, Attahiru Jega, that about 1.3 million of the 1.7 million registered voters in Anambra were unable to exercise their franchise and could not vote because of the late arrival or non-delivery of voting materials. “In announcing the cancellation of the National Assembly election in 2011, INEC Chairman Attahiru Jega said, among others, that it was to ‘maintain the integrity of the elections and retain effective overall control of the process,” Lai Mohammed said. APC said the situation in Anambra last Saturday was even more serious because in addition to the fact that voting materials were either late or not delivered at all, most voters were disenfranchised by an INEC official who apparently tampered with the 2011 voters’ register for the state. Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is therefore wrong to say that only the courts can order the cancellation of last Saturday’s governorship election in Anambra State
“Therefore, there are more compelling reasons now to cancel the Anambra governorship election than what led to the cancellation and rescheduling of the National Assembly election in 2011.” It also said since the integrity of the 2011 voters’ register has been compromised by tampering, that register can no longer be relied upon by INEC to organise any election in Nigeria. “The emerging allegations are very serious. First, the voters’ register for Anambra has been allegedly tampered with by an INEC official to disenfranchise a huge number of voters, to such an extent that only 451,826 voters were accredited out of the 1,763,751 registered voters in Anambra State.
“Secondly, the disenfranchisement started from the data capturing stage, when the machine was apparently manipulated not to capture those whose names start with ‘O’ or ‘U’ and that is a whole lot of people. Against this background, it is obvious to all fair-minded people, that INEC ‘s computer data-base must have been fraudulently, irreparably and totally adulterated such that no credible voters’ register can anymore be produced from the 2011 voters’ registration data.” APC therefore calls for not just for the cancellation of the Anambra governorship election, but also insists that a fresh election cannot and must not be conducted on the basis of the 2011 voters’ register.
APC also calls on Prof. Jega not to withhold the names of the main saboteurs in Saturday’s Anambra Gubernatorial poll and to also investigate the level to which the voters’ register has been compromised, fish out all those involved, find out who their sponsors are and make all of them to face justice.
