After the State Assembly elections, the 27 state House of Assembly candidates of Labour Party in Imo State have called for the immediate sack and prosecution of the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Imo State, Prof Sylvia over corruption, incompetence and total disregard to electoral rules.
Spokesperson of the 27 candidates, Comrade Precious Nwadike, flanked by the others at a press briefing in Owerri lampooned INEC over what they described as massive electoral flaws during the March 18 election across the state.
He said “In view of the monstrous activities and complicity of the Imo state REC, we are calling for her immediate sack, investigation and prosecution because she showed glaring signs of corruption, incompetence and total disregard to the ordinances of the electoral guidelines and electoral act”.
Further, he condemned the REC over her alleged refusal to release certified true copies of results to enable them file their petitions before the Election Tribunal.
According to them, elections did not hold in many wards and local governments where insecurity reigned adding that Prof Sylvia using the outlawed Ebubeagu security outfit forged results in favour of All Progressives Congress and described it as a highly questionable victory.Nwadike said it was regrettable that till date, “The INEC led by Prof Sylvia Agu is doing everything to frustrate issuance of certified true copies of result to all the 27 Labour Party candidates in Imo to enable us to complete our filing in court despite court order.
“It is no longer news that the Imo REC for the period of the two elections was seen holding meetings with agents of All Progressive Congress, from where she took instructions to carry out all her hatchet jobs against Imo people, and only visited her office at Port Harcourt Road with heavy security personnel provided her by the APC government in Imo state of which principal has become the latest lord of the Manor. Suffice it to say that she sold her conscience by endorsing the charade called elections in Imo which was marred by massive rigging and falsification of results polling units while accepting results written by APC agents without BVAS accreditation for which the new electoral act says is a nullity abinitio. All this she did with utmost disregard to her status as a Professor’’, he said.
The Labour candidates accused the Imo Resident Electoral Commissioner of bias as she didn’t allow the party agents to collate results from the polling units via the wards to the local governments adding that evidence show that her reprehensible mannerisms, the Imo elections has earned the worst in the history of Imo state.
While they commended Imo people for trooping out enmasse to vote for them, they assured that they will not take it for granted as they have commenced activities to reclaim their victory, “not excluding organising protests to register our displeasure over the broad daylight rape of democracy in Imo state”.
The 27 candidates regretted the massive rigging and harassment of voters across the 27 local governments noting that it was a clear case of organized robbery, imposition and impunity saying it was not an election.
Other candidates like the candidate for Owerri Municipal, Hon Clinton Amadi said the IREV portal showed that he and several others won the election clearly adding that INEC declared losers as winners.
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