Osun poll: PDP demands resignation of INEC chairman

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has demanded the immediate resignation of Mahmood Yakubu, chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

In a statement on Tuesday, the PDP accused him of “controlling role in the fraudulent manipulations that characterised” the Osun state governorship election.

It also called for the resignation of Amina Zakari, INEC national commissioner, who it claimed was in charge of information communication technology (ICT) department, where election results were allegedly “altered” to favour the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Ademola Adeleke, governorship candidate of the PDP, had polled majority vote of 254,698 while Isiaka Oyetola, candidate of the APC, had 254,345 votes, leaving a margin of 353.

INEC had declared the election inconclusive, saying the margin between the two candidates was not significant enough to declare a winner.

The party alleged that INEC shortchanged its candidate of 4,387 votes as against the 353 votes margin that was declared, saying Nigerians have lost confidence in the judgement of the electoral chairman.

“It is completely inexcusable that Prof. Yakubu presides over an atrocious and compromised electoral umpire that manipulates electoral processes, doctors figures, allocates fictitious votes and subverts the will of the people in an election,” the statement read.

“The PDP has additional documentary evidence of how this compromised INEC, through its operations and ICT department, doctored results from polling centers, directly shortchanged the PDP with no fewer than 4,387 votes by slashing votes cast for the PDP at the polling centers while allocating fictitious figures to the APC.

“The PDP has facts on how INEC slashed over 1000 votes freely cast by the people for our candidate, Senator Ademola Adeleke, in Ayedaade local government area, just to reduce our votes from our legitimate 10,836 votes cast at the polling centers to 9,836 votes so as to give APC the lead with a 1000 vote margin in the local government.

“Also, the PDP has evidence of how INEC, while collating results, directly allocated over 1,367 fictitious votes to the APC in Olorunda local government area, to fraudulently shore up the APC votes to duplicitous 16,254 votes. This is in addition to evidence of how INEC awarded over 2,000 fictitious votes in favour of the APC in Oshogbo to push APC’s vote to 23,379 against the actual 21,479 votes scored by the defeated party.

“Such writing of results by INEC in collusion with the APC occurred in many other areas leading to INEC’s ill-fated directives to its junior officials, including the one apprehended in Ayedaade, to destroy results already displayed at polling and collation centers.

“It was after INEC and the APC realized that despite their manipulation of figures, our candidate still scored the highest number of votes, making him the clear winner of the election, that they decided to fraudulently apply unconstitutional grounds to declare the election inconclusive.

“From the facts available to us, INEC robbed our party of over 4,387 votes. Our actual winning margin stands at 4,740 votes against the 353 votes declared by INEC.

“While Prof. Mahmood Yakubu can no longer be trusted to conduct the 2019 general elections, it is public knowledge that Mrs. Amina Zakari, the INEC National Commissioner, Supervising Electoral Operations is a direct blood relation of Mr. President and as such, we believe that she cannot be an impartial arbiter in an election involving her uncle.

“The PDP therefore calls on all patriotic Nigerians to join in the demand for the resignation of Prof. Yakubu and Mrs. Zakari so as to avert this dangerous path, where INEC is leading our nation.”

The party said the action of the electoral body during the Osun election is an indication that the commission has connived with the APC to rig the general election.