By Sunday Ani
Enugu State Chapter of the Labour Party (LP) has rejected the result of the governorship elections that took place on March, 18, 2023, which declared the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Peter Mbah as the winner, describing it as a rape on democracy.
A statement by the Enugu State Publicity Secretary of the LP, Onuora Odo, a copy of which was made available to the Daily Sun, described the results that produced Mba as a sham, insisting that the election was marred by widespread and wholesale rigging, intimidation of voters, doctoring, mutilation and manipulation of the results, particularly the result of Nkanu East.
Part of the statement read: “It’s on record that the process of accreditation and use of BVAS was not followed in some of the polling booths, especially Nkanu East.
“It’s also on record that in the course of the collation of results, the results of Nkanu East showed monumental disparities between the number of registered voters and the total number of votes, but the obviously compromised Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) decided to disregard the provisions of the Electoral Act and went ahead to declare the conspicuously padded results despite complaints from the opposition parties.
“This was the reason they deliberately delayed the announcement of the result to pave the way for further manipulations.
“The position of the party, therefore, is that the result as declared by INEC on March 22, 2023, four days after the elections were concluded, was heavily doctored and does not reflect the wishes of ndi Enugu State.
“In view of the foregoing developments, we are, by this media release, registering our dissatisfaction over the electoral irregularities and malfeasances activated and actuated by heavy financial inducements. Let it be known that our great party is poised to deepen the root of democracy in Nigeria and cannot fold its arms and allow this level of electoral heist to go unchallenged.
“In due course, the position of the party will be made known as we have started assembling our facts together to do the needful. Surely, this is a rape on democracy.”