The chairman of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Bayelsa State, Southern, Nigeria, Dr. Dennis otiotio has rejected the result of the Bayelsa State governorship election which was declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC).
In an interview with Voice of Nigeria, in Yenagoa, the capital of Bayelsa State, Southern, Nigeria, the chairman stated his reason for rejecting the result. “It is due to wide spread irregularities and corrupt practices that characterise the election.”
He went further to say that, APC won the Bayelsa State governorship clearly and fairly but our votes were delibrately cancelled by INEC.
In Nembe local government area, over 28,000 votes were cancelled and INEC did not allow the collation of the results to take place in Nembe, Brass and Southern Ijaw local government areas, out of the eight local government areas in the state.
“The results of these local government areas were taken to the INEC head office in the state capital Yenagoa to collate.”
Dr. Dennis otiotio also explained that the INEC regulation and guidelines for elections stated that in areas where there are cancellations, the returning officer should perform supplimary elections in that area and add to the existing areas before the results should be announced.
He went ahead to mention the different scores between the People Democratic Party (PDP) and that of his party, APC which was about 65,000 votes and while the total numbers where election did not hold were about 70,000 votes.
The chairman stated that, the result that was announced by INEC, with the PDP scoring 175,196 votes, APC scored 110,108 votes, while areas were election were cancelled APC had about 67,375 votes while PDP had 14,430 votes.
“If all these cancellations are added together, APC score will be 177,483 votes, while the PDP would have 175,626 votes. APC won the election with 108,57 votes,” he stated.
The chairman also stressed out the plan of his party APC to reclaim their mandate.
“We have written a petition to the chairman of INEC, in Bayelsa State because the electoral act has given the INEC the power to review result within seven days of declaration.”
He advised INEC to do justice to the petition that was submitted to the commission, ” I believe that INEC should do the right thing and do justice to the petition, and if INEC does not, reverse the illegal cancellation of the results, then we don’t have any option than to go to tribunal”.
The chairman also advised Bayelsans to be patient, peaceful and go about their normal businesses and he assured the people that their mandates they have given to APC at the polls are protected and the party is doing everything possible to reclaim their mandate.
In the same vein, the APC party agent at Brass local government area and former member of Bayelsa State House of Assembly, Honourable Amalanyo Yousuo, was sad about the decision of Bayelsa State, INEC.
According to him; “the election was peaceful in my local government area but after the election, there was a directive from INEC to send the results to the INEC head office in Yenagoa. We initially not accept the decision but because of pressure, we have to go to Yenagoa, at the time we got there, Ward seven to ten were announced without the present of any of our agents.”
He went ahead to appeal with the party and also to the party governorship candidate, Chief Timipre Sylva to take the case to the tribunal.
Meanwhile, the Bayelsa State governorship election took place on the 11th of November 2023. The result of the election was announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), that the winner of the election was Senator Douye Diri of the People Democratic Party (PDP).
Lateefah Ibrahim
