The All Progressives Congress (APC), Delta chapter, has alleged plans by the state Independent Electoral Commission (DSIEC) to announce fake results during the Oct. 25 local council polls in the state.
The state Secretary of the APC, Mr Chidi Okonji, who made the allegation at a news conference on Thursday in Asaba, however, said the party was ready to challenge any form of electoral fraud during the polls.
“There is widespread speculation going on now of plans by the state electoral commission to announce already prepared results for the coming local government elections in the state.
“But I can bet you that if the plans go through, we at the APC will mobilise our supporters to challenge the results.
“Our women are ready to go naked and curse whoever attempts to rig the coming election because the people are tired of this system. Our people need a change,” Okonji said.
The APC scribe faulted the failure of the DSIEC to publish and display the voters’ register with barely two weeks to the elections.
Okonji expressed fear that the development did not augur well for the conduct of a free and fair credible local council polls in the state.
“The delay in publishing the voters’ register by DSIEC is a scientific way of rigging the elections.
“As it is now, I can not tell you that I am sure that this coming elections will be free and fair; but I bet you that we will resist any attempt to deny our people their right to elect their choice candidate.”
On the alleged defection of some APC members in the state to APGA, Okonji dismissed the allegation as a mere rumour
He said no card-carrying member of the APC in Delta defected.
“The story that some of our members recently defected to APGA is not true. Those people that went to declare for APGA are not our members.
“Anybody can wake up and say he is an APC member, but if you ask them to produce their identity card, they don’t have it.”
However, when contacted, the Chairman of DSIEC, Mr. Moses Ogbe, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that the allegations by the APC scribe were unfounded.
“How can we announce an already prepared result when the election has not even been conducted? This is ridiculous.
“We have not even gotten the result sheets; so how do we announce results. The APC’s allegation is a false claim intended to cause disharmony ahead of the elections,” Ogbe said.
The DSIEC boss explained that the commission could not meet up with the earlier plan to display the voters’ register ib September due to the delay in receiving the original register from INEC.
He said that DSIEC only received a soft copy of the register from INEC on Oct. 3, adding that the commission was currently printing out the register for onward display in all councils in the state.
“We just got the DVD of the voters register from INEC on the 3rd of October; we are presently printing them out.
“So far, we have completed the printing of 16 local government areas registers; once the printing is completed, we will publish them in all local government areas.
“DSIEC is going to use the voter register produce by INEC; we can not produce a separate voters’ register.
“The process is not as easy as they think. We are talking about over two million voters in the state,” Ogbe said.
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