Electoral Commission (INEC).
Speaking on Wednesday when a crowd of youth supporters marched to the
Government House to protest the conduct of the just-concluded elections,
Okorocha accused the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) posted to the
state of working against him.
According to Okorocha, anyone who decides to go against him would lose.
INEC had removed Okorocha’s name from the list of senators-elect who will
be presented certificates on Thursday March 14, 2019. According to the
commission, Okorocha was declared winner of the election “under duress”.
However, the Governor has kicked against the move, saying: “In my own
case, my Certificate of Return has not been issued and I wonder why INEC
will withhold my certificate for a frivolous reason, without hearing from
me.
“I am not a violent person and those who know me know that. This is why we
have peace in Imo State. The Returning Officer could not have done that
under duress under the watchful eyes of the Police, DSS and party agents.
I am not unmindful of the fact that those who are fighting me from Abuja
are anxious to see me removed as a senator. I urge INEC to do the right
thing immediately by releasing my certificate.
“Let me tell every Nigerian that I fought no one and no one should fight
me. If anyone fights me, he will be the loser at the end of it all. My
INEC Certificate cannot be touched or seized, doing so is belittling
democracy in Nigeria. It is only the tribunal that has the right to say
otherwise once a result is declared. INEC cannot seize my certificate by
mere petition written by somebody in a case I was not given the
opportunity to present my own side of the story.”
He also rejected the result of the governorship election in the state,
stating that Emeka Ihedioha, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party
(PDP) and Imo Governor-elect, didn’t have the required number of votes to
emerge winner.
He continued: “The REC had acted illegally by ignoring the provision of
the Constitution that makes it mandatory for a candidate to have 25 per
cent in two-thirds of the local governments in the state by announcing the
PDP candidate, Emeka Ihedioha who only met the requirement in 9 Local
Governments instead of 18 LGAs, which is two-thirds of 27 LGAs winner.”
Noting that figures from Aboh Mbaise, Ahiazu Mbaise and Ezinihitte, where
the PDP candidate got 64,219 votes from Aboh Mbaise alone, were
“outrageous”, he stressed that Uche Nwosu, governorship candidate of
Action Alliance (AA) won the election and had the required spread by
securing 25 percent of the votes in 21 out of the 27 LGAs in the state.
“For the REC to have ignored the Constitutional provision for the
announcement of the winner of the governorship election only explains his
desperation to announce the PDP candidate winner.
“I say so because going by the actual calculation, the person that won
this election is Ugwumba Uche Nwosu. Uche Nwosu won the election in a
landslide. If you remove the manipulated results from Mbaise, Uche Nwosu
won with over 50,000 votes. If you cannot declare him a winner because you
have someone already, then they should go for a rerun because you cannot
change the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria because you
want to favour a candidate.
“In the course of this manipulation, we all observed that the REC decided
not to use the collation officers from Federal University of Technology
Owerri (FUTO), which he disbanded for reasons he gave that they have met
with politicians. Again, he brought some people whom he introduced from
the University of Agriculture, Umudike. They arrived just a night before
the election date and we thought we have gotten the collation officers.
Again, those ones were disbanded for the same reason that they have met
with politicians. I wonder how this is possible having arrived the state
after midnight on the eve of election day.
“Now the REC went to his own university in Awka to bring in collation
officers. We believed him, not knowing that he brought people he has been
training for a hatched job for some weeks now in Anambra State to come and
carry out this injustice in Imo State.
“These men arrived with heavy security from Anambra and went straight to
the various Local Governments. We never knew that these were relatives of
the PDP candidate and from the same Local Government. These are relatives
of the PDP candidate, who were already briefed on what to do. This
explains the over voting witnessed in Mbaise. Out of the 270,000 votes
that he scored, 50 per cent of it or over 130,000 all came from just three
local governments of Mbaise.
As far as I am concerned, we still maintain that REC has wrecked democracy
in Imo State. Unfortunately for them, they were not smart enough to know
that Section 179 requires you to have a spread at least in two-third of
the local governments before you can be declared a winner. They ended up
with only nine local governments instead of 18 required by law. The
Returning Officer was advised by all the senior staff of INEC against
declaring a winner without looking at the Constitution. This man in a
hurry decided to announce the result against the Constitution of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“This is wrong. In doing so, the Returning Officer didn’t even consider
the results cancelled. Total votes cancelled in the different polling
booths was enough to declare the election inconclusive as the difference
between the PDP and AA would have called for a supplementary election. The
speed with which he announced the result tells you that the man is part of
the game. This again is unacceptable to all of us.
“It is obvious that this fight is targeted against me by some of those who
have decided to fight me from Abuja. I am ready to take this fight as much
as I can, but don’t transfer this aggression you have against me to
anybody associated with me; that would not be acceptable. Allow the young
man who won the election to be so declared.”
Comrade Ezenna Okoro, who led the youth, expressed dissatisfaction with
the election outcome and issued an ultimatum to the commission to address
the issue.
“INEC should not provoke us and we are giving them 24 hours to reverse the
election of Imo North Senatorial Zone won by Emenike, and as a matter of
fact give us a date for the rerun between Uche Nwosu and the PDP
candidate, having failed to make up the Constitutional requirement,” he
stated.