July 15, 2018

The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has rejected Saturday’s Ekiti State governorship election results as declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

INEC had declared Dr Kayode Fayemi, a former Minister of Mines and Steel Development and candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), winner of the election with 197,459 votes.

According to the result declared by Prof. Idowu Olayinka, the Chief Returning Officer for the election and Vice Chancellor, University of Ibadan, the PDP candidate, Prof. Kolapo Olusola, came second with 178,121 votes.

The PDP National Publicity Secretary, Mr Kola Ologbondiyan, at a news conference on Sunday in Abuja, described the election result as “a daylight robbery”.

“The PDP rejects in its entirety the results concocted by the APC, and security agencies, in the governorship election in Ekiti State and declared by INEC.

He said the PDP was already collating all infractions in the election and would make its next steps public soon in order to reclaim its “stolen mandate”.

“The party rejects the falsified results and declaration of APC candidate, Dr Fayemi, to be the winner of the election, as a daylight robbery, a brazen subversion of the will of the people and direct assault on our democracy.

“From the authentic results flowing directly from the polling centres across the state, it is clear that the PDP candidate, Prof. Olusola-Eleka, incontrovertibly won the election, with very comfortable margin over the APC candidate, only for INEC to allow the alteration of results at the collation centres.

“Painfully, the people of Ekiti State were pillaged; openly brutalized; confronted with the worst form of cruelty and intimidation from security agencies, and their mandate, which they freely gave to the PDP, was snatched at ‘gun point’ by enemies of democracy, who are parading themselves as icons of anti-corruption.

“Nigerians are witnesses to all manipulations by the APC, aided by security agencies and compromised INEC officials, to rig the election, particularly, the audacious alteration and substitution of election results in favour of the APC at the collation centres amidst the brutalization of our agents.”

Ologbondiyan said that the PDP had the details of all the polling units where it won, mostly with very wide margin ahead of the APC.

He alleged that security agencies chased away PDP agents, “then aided the alteration and swapping of such results with those smuggled in by the APC at the collation centres.

“We have the details of the discrepancies between the authentic results from the polling units and the false figures eventually announced by INEC.”

Ologbondiyan said that the party also had details of how APC state governors and federal ministers diverted huge sums of money from their states and ministries to bribe INEC top officials.

He also alleged that the APC bribed security agencies to perfect the brigandage against the people of Ekiti State.

“The PDP holds strongly that there is no way our democracy can survive with an electoral process as witnessed in Ekiti State under President Muhammadu Buhari and the current INEC leadership.

“This bare-faced subversion of the will of the people is a clear recipe for crisis.”

He further described the alleged robbery of the franchise of Ekiti people as “a horrible rape of Nigerian democracy”.

“Finally, let it be known to all that surely, this electoral banditry will not stand.”

When asked of the party’s view on Fayose’s alleged declaration of election result on radio before INEC, Ologbondiyan said the party would investigate what led to that.