Edo Polls: Ighodalo, PDP Face Backlash Over iREV Results

Three weeks after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Senator Monday Okpebholo governor-elect in Edo State, a leading pro-democracy forum has made some startling revelations against the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Asue Ighodalo.

The Abuja-based Initiative for Democratic Advancement and Free Speech, in a statement in Abuja, told the PDP in Edo State to accept the outcome of the September 21 governorship election rather than trying to whip up sentiments using media propaganda.

In a statement yesterday, the organisation’s executive director, Patrick Osaigbovo, said it was unfortunate that the main plank of the PDP and its candidate, Ighodalo’s case, was on the functionality or otherwise of the results viewing portal of INEC.

Osaigbovo lamented that since the election, the PDP has increased its onslaught on institutions of the Nigerian state – from INEC to security agencies and others.

“Such onslaughts are a carryover of its pre-election strategy of using crass propaganda to attempt to intimidate state institutions and pull a wool over the faces of the electorate.

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“As a good governance advocacy group committed to deepening Nigeria’s electoral democracy, we daresay that the PDP, through its actions and or inactions, lost the people even before the election,” he stated.

According to him, when the candidate of the APC, Senator Okpebholo, started this campaign from unit to unit, ward to ward, local governments to local governments, the opposition concentrated on media propaganda, sponsoring TV appearances and appealing to diaspora sentiments, as opposed to interfacing with the local people in real time, who would vote on the actual election day.

“One of them went as far as placing a bet of N5 million on national TV that the PDP would win the election as if the lives and well-being of Edo people were a matter of sports betting. That alone showed that the PDP came to gamble with the people’s aspirations,” he stated.

Noting that the PDP went on clearly to usurp the powers of INEC to declare results, the pro-democracy group added that it was unfortunate that the PDP is also relying on the “verdict” of some partisan groups masquerading as election observer groups.

Osaigbovo said the so-called observer groups went beyond their bounds of duty by publicly declaring opposition to the results released by INEC, noting that they were merely to observe the polls and make recommendations to the electoral umpire.

Part of the statement reads, “By INEC guidelines, results are to be uploaded to its Results Viewing Portal iREV when the last person on the line finishes voting. However, the PDP began churning out its own results from its so-called ‘Situation Room’ as early as 10 am, purporting them to be from the iReV. Churning out results from units where voters were still in the queue was only meant to serve a predetermined outcome and set the stage for post-election violence in the state.

“In any case, the PDP is again building castles in the air, resorting to predicting the substance of its case on the iReV.

“While the results as declared by INEC conform with what is available on the IReV, we must, however, remind the PDP that it was barely a year ago, in October 2023, that the Supreme Court held that the failure of the INEC to electronically transmit election results via the IReV portal did not affect the collation.

“For emphasis, Justice Inyang Okoro, who led the panel of five Supreme Court justices, delivered the judgment in the appeals brought forth by Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) and Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), contesting the ruling of the Presidential Elections Petitions Court (PEPC), which affirmed Bola Tinubu’s victory in February of that year.

“Justice Okoro noted that the Electoral Act empowers INEC to determine the mode of transmission of election results and that the appellants failed to prove noncompliance with the Electoral Law but relied solely on INEC’s inability to electronically transmit the election results to the INEC Results Viewing (IReV) portal.

“The apex court consequently declared that the unavailability of election results on the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV) could not serve as a basis for the annulment of the presidential election held in February 2023.

“Rather than sponsoring partisan groups claiming to be election observers, the PDP would do well to put its house in order.

“The PDP ought to have understood by now that election observer groups are not the same as election monitors. Nigeria has only one election monitor – INEC. Observer groups are meant to observe. They have no locus to reject any results as declared by INEC. The PDP should stop building castles in the air and start preparing for the 2028 election,” he added.

In a swift reaction, the deputy director-general of media to the PDP Campaign Council, Reverend Olu Martins, described the claims as baseless.

He said the claims can’t be substantiated by those alleging. “The allegations are baseless,” he noted, adding that “they can’t substantiate the claims.

“The election observers are not new guys in the system. They have been observing election processes. We should improve our electoral system. Many observers concluded that the processes were free and fair at the units.”