The People’s Democratic Party and the Independent National Electoral Commission were allegedly planning to move some polling places in order to annoy voters on election day, according to the All Progressives Congress in Oyo State on Sunday.
The claim was made in a statement released on Sunday and provided to journalists in Ibadan by Olawale Sadare, the APC’s publicity secretary.
The APC spokesperson claimed that the state’s opposition party had access to an intelligence report that claimed Seyi Makinde, the governor of the state, had compromised some corrupt INEC officials in order to help move polling places in the state to places that might be difficult to access, impossible to reach, or even nonexistent on election day.Information Guide Nigeria
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The statement read, “Makinde, already getting the signals pointing to his inevitable electoral doom, has issued a standing instruction to some bad eggs within the Oyo State office of INEC, to immediately relocate several polling units across the state, from their advertised addresses to unknown or obscure locations.
“A run-through of the affected units revealed clearly the devil behind the detail; they are units considered strongholds of our party, which given the pervasive atmosphere of free, fair, and credible elections in Nigeria, our party is expected to win hands down, without fuss.
“By this notice, we alert the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, the Zonal Electoral Commissioner, the Resident Electoral Commissioner and all electoral stakeholders to beam the commission’s searchlight on the activities of INEC staff, especially those in the Oyo State office, so that they do not allow some bad eggs tarnish the commission’s hard-earned reputation nor put to disrepute, its concerted efforts at organising free, fair and credible polls.
“We have put behind us the ugly experience of 2019 when a supposed unbiased umpire became an interested party and connived with the PDP to perpetrate electoral fraud. The hatchet job was well done such that most polling stations were turned to drinking joints by PDP members as early as 12 noon on the election day as a result of the assurance they had got.
“But this time round, INEC shall be made accountable for all unclaimed PVC, electoral materials and the proper conduct of the poll.”
The spokesman of the PDP in Oyo State, Mr Akeem Olatunji, said in an interview with our correspondent that it has dawned on the APC that its electoral failure was imminent.
He said, “Their allegation on relocating polling units confirms the notion that APC is practically dead in Oyo. When someone has lost a fight, they will be fabricating reasons for their defeat and that is exactly what the APC is doing now.
“They know that they cannot win without manipulation and the plan has been blocked by INEC, so that is why they have resorted to spurious allegations.
“We are not the ruling party at the federal level and INEC is a federal agency so, how is it possible for the opposition party to control the agency under the ruling party? They are saying what they have in mind about rigging the coming election but we are confident that INEC under Prof. Mahmood Yakubu would do a good job in 2023 elections.
“With the BVAS introduced by INEC APC knows that they cannot get half of the votes they got in 2019 because the party had scattered and defeating them this time would cause us to break a sweat.”JAMB Result
