.Alleges electoral fraud
By Valentine Amanze
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has rejected the result of the local government elections held in Kaduna State on Saturday.
The opposition party through its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, described the result of the election, which was won by the All Progressives Congress (APC) as fraud.
It wondered why APC was declared winner in areas clearly won by the PDP, while alleging
alteration of final results by Kaduna State Independent Electoral Commission (KADSIECOM).
“From the reports of results at the polling centres, it is clear that the PDP defeated the APC in most of the areas where elections held across the state, including Governor Nasir el-Rufai’s ward where the PDP led with over 90 percent of the votes cast.
“The result of this election is a clear testimony of our popularity in the state. As such, PDP rejects the fraud by Kaduna State Independent Electoral Commission (KADSIECOM) in altering the results in favour of APC.
“It is totally intolerable for KADSIECOM, working in cahoots with the discredited APC to engage in the manipulation of the collation process by changing the figures and announcing final results that are different from figures tallied at the polling centres,” PDP stated.
The opposition party also stated that it had instances where final electoral officers were whisked away to unknown destinations by agents of Kaduna State government, aided by security agencies, while fake results were being announced in favour of the APC.
“For instance, while voters and party agents were still waiting for the return of electoral officer, Mr. Elisha Gandu, at the Kajuru Local Government secretariat, where results from polling centres show that the PDP won nine out of the 10 wards, the Nagarta Radio was busy announcing APC as winner. This is the situation in most of the final results so far announced by the commission and we cannot accept such,” the party stated.
It also warned
the Chairman of KADSIECOM, Dr. Saratu Binta Dikko-Audu, to save the state from avoidable stress by resisting the APC, withdrawing all altered final results and announcing only results that reflect the actual wishes of the people as expressed in the ballot.
