Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) led officials of the party on Monday on a protest to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Abuja over the Feb. 25 election.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that some of the officials included PDP National Chairman, Sen. Iyorchia Ayu, and National Working Committee members.
Ayu presented a party protest letter to INEC, calling for the cancellation of the election in which the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Sen. Bola Tinubu, was declared the winner.
He urged INEC to conduct a credible election that would be acceptable to all.
“On behalf of the people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the teeming members of the PDP, we present this protest letter to INEC, addressed to the Commission Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu.
“We do not accept the charades of what has been presented to the Nigerian people as an election and what has been declared.”
“We, there, call on INEC not only to cancel the election but to re-conduct a very credible election, not only to Nigerians but also to the international community,” Ayu said.
Receiving the letter, the INEC National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Mr. Festus Okoye, commended the party for a peaceful protest, promising to submit the letter to the appropriate authorities for necessary action.
“I have received this letter on behalf of the commission; if there are remedial issues to be dealt with, we are going to deal with those remedial issues.”
This commission is for the Nigerian people. Our allegiance is to the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“This commission does not have allegiance to any political party or candidate; our allegiance is to the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” Okoye said.
NAN reports that the protesters, who were dressed in black, carried placards with different inscriptions, such as “INEC is corrupt,.
“It is time for change, “INEC release the real results,” “enough is enough,” and “Mahmood Yakubu resign now.”
Speaking, Kola Ologbondiyan, spokesperson for the Atiku/Okowa Campaign Organization, told NAN that the demand of the party was that Mahmood should fulfill the promise he made to Nigerians at the collation center that he was going to review the election results.
“You were there during the collation, when Yakubu promised Nigerians that he would review the collation. Has he reviewed it?
“We are asking him to review the collation just as he has promised. He should review it,” said Ologbondiyan.
Asked why the party protested after accepting to challenge the election outcome in court, Ologbondiyan said that the party had the right to expose to the world the illegality of INEC under Yakubu.
“We have a right to this test, and we are expressing it to the world so that it knows that what Yakubu has done is a total disregard to the constitution and all the electoral status in Nigeria.”
“That is what we are expressing, and we have a right to it.” As a corporate citizens to protest and we are protesting it,” he said.
INEC had declared Tinubu the winner of the presidential poll after he scored 8,794,726 votes, the most of all the candidates, thus meeting the first constitutional requirement to be declared the winner.
He also scored over 25 percent of the votes cast in 30 states, more than the 24 constitutionally required.
Atiku Abubakar came in second with 6,984,520 votes.
(NAN)
