PDP/DOM/INEC/19-004
Monday March 4, 2019
The Chairman
Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)
Zambezi Crescent
Maitama District
Abuja, FCT.
Dear Sir,
We want to place on records and bring to your attention the very obvious
and noticeable infractions and violations of the Electoral Law and the
Regulations/Guidelines regulating the 2019 general elections which have
very negative implications on the credibility, transparency and
integrity of the entire electoral processes particularly the just
concluded Presidential and National Assembly elections.
This has become imperative as we approach the Gubernatorial and State
House of Assembly elections billed for Saturday, March 9,2019.
These infractions and deliberate violations include but not limited to
the following:
- The non-usage or selective enforcement of the Smart Card Reader (SCR)
machines across the country. We observed with regrets that the usage of
the SCR machines were enforced strategically in the South-South,
South-East and the North-Central zones of the country which are
essentially PDP strongholds. This is radically different from what
transpired in the North-West, North-East and the South-West which were
estimated as the APC strongholds. This is quite contrary to the
provisions of Paragraph 10(a) & (b) of the Regulations and Guidelines
governing the 2019 General Elections and all the assurances you, Prof.
Yakub Mahmood, frequently gave up to the last hours before the
elections.
- The deliberate non-deployment of the Electronic Collation System
(E-Collation) for the elections results from the units, through the ward
centers to the Presidential Collation Center in Abuja as provided for in
the 2019 Electoral Regulations and Guidelines made by you, and as
contained in your several official Press Statements is very suspect.
This is more so when you have never bothered to explain to Nigerians the
justification for this sudden official somersault on such a critical
component of the electoral process especially with all the tax payer’s
money spent to install the facilities.
- The unconstitutional deployment of the armed forces especially
soldiers and police for the illegitimate purposes to harassing,
intimidating, suppressing of leaders of the PDP and suppression of
voters in PDP strongholds across the country which are very well known
to you. The use of these same security agents by the government to
harass and intimidate Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) and
certain INEC’s National Commissioners for the sake of forcing them to
declare votes for the APC’s candidates throughout the country have been
officially or otherwise brought to your knowledge by the affected
officers who even threatened to resign from their positions, yet you
have decided to keep mute over it in a way portraying outright
conspiracy and collusion of yourself and the commission with the APC
government perpetrators.
- We also want to bring to your knowledge that most of the collation
centers in the country were cordoned off by officers and men of the
armed forces who chased away accredited agents and or candidates of our
party, the PDP, from such centers while the results of the elections
from the units were being manipulated, mutilated and altered to suite
the dictates and criminal desires of the APC led government. These
results that were tampered with were accepted by you and your commission
and announced as the results of the elections.
- In places like Lagos, Rivers, Nassarawa, Abia, Benue, Plateau, Ondo,
Osun States el al, results of duly conducted elections were illegally
canceled especially in the PDP dominated areas to reduce the margin of
victory in those states in Favour of APC candidates. Is it not
surprising to you that Lagos state with over six million voters can only
return less than one million votes? This was the case in virtually all
PDP dominated states where voter’s suppression was deployed as a major
strategy by you and the APC government in active collaboration of some
of your unscrupulous RECs and staffers.
- We are sure that till date the commission does not know the number of
polling units where elections were cancelled and the total number of
registered voters at such polling units. Yet you hurriedly announced the
results of the elections especially the Presidential election only to
come up with a Press Statement that supplementary elections will be
conducted on March 9, 2019 along with the Gubernatorial and House of
Assembly Elections. This to say the least is a major dent on the
credibility and image of the commission.
- Under your watch as Chairman of INEC for the first time in our
nation’s history, the election materials of all categories; sensitive
and non-sensitive, were contracted to be printed by a person who is not
just a card-carrying member of a political party; the APC but also a
Senatorial Candidate of the party in Niger State. Arising from this,
these sensitive materials were seen in several wrong and unauthorized
hands and places before and during the elections. Till this moment your
commission has not raised any concerns or set up any enquiry to uncover
the immediate or remote causes of such criminal and unconstitutional
bastardization of the electoral process.
We have taken time to chronicle the above fundamental deliberate
violations and infractions of the Electoral Law, Regulations and
Guidelines and all known canons of electoral best practices by your
Commission in obvious complicity and collaboration with APC and security
agencies to rig the elections and rob our party of victory.
We want to remind you that as we inch towards Saturday, March 9, 2019
elections, you must do everything to right these grave anomalies to save
yourself and the commission from this woeful embarrassment as you may go
down in history as the worst Chairman of INEC in our history.
Accept our regards.
Prince Uche Secondus
National Chairman
Sen. Ibrahim Umaru Tsauri
National Secretary
