From Noah Ebije, Kaduna
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Kaduna State has rejected the declaration by Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of Senator Uba Sani of the APC as governor-elect of Kaduna State, alleging it was a daylight robbery.
Speaking at a press conference, Chairman of the PDP, Kaduna State chapter, Felix Hassan Hyat, alleged that INEC was complicit in denying the people of Kaduna State what they actually voted for, and was inconsistent in declaring results.
“You will please recall my press conference yesterday, 20th March,2023 during which I demanded the use of authentic results from the INEC Server (IReV) as the only accepted results for declaration of governorship in our State.
“This was because the lack of transparency from INEC officials was glaring and justice will not be done.
“Our fears were confirmed last night when the State Gubernatorial Returning Officer, Prof. Lawal Suleiman Bilbis, used the questionable results to declare Senator Uba Sani of the APC as elected with 730,002votes against 719,196 votes allocated to our Candidate, Rt. Hon.Mohamed Isah Ashiru of the PDP.
“The PDP rejects this result and the declaration of Sen. Uba Sani as winner of the Gubernatorial Elections of 18/03/2023 in our dear Kaduna State.
“May I seize this opportunity to sincerely thank our numerous supporters and the good people of Kaduna State for the mandate they have given us and want to assure them that the PDP will not leave any stone unturned in the quest for re-claiming their mandate.
“We have commenced actions necessary and in accordance with the law with a view to arrest this glaring broad day robbery against the people of Kaduna State by APC Government and its collaborators.”
“I appeal for your continuous prayers and support with the firm assurance that We will fight this cause to its logical conclusion.I call on all to remain calm, law abiding and prayerful”. He said.
While fielding questions from Reporters, Hyat said they would take legal action on the matter.
“Certainly, there are different ways of taking action but all would be according to the laws of the land.
“We realized there is a place in the Electoral law that gives us room to call for a review of the declaration before we talk of the issue of going to the Tribunal”.
On the option of a protest to support the court action,he said the party does not talk of protest.
“Our protest is what we have told you. We have rejected the result and we would take all measures that are lawful to reclaim the mandate of the people of Kaduna State”.
He said “the system of collection of result was very untidy and unreliable. Figures kept on being changed. At that time we said people had gone to Lere again, and to Kudan.To ascertain what?Another result or what?Therefore whatever we have seen and whatever that have been declared,we feel it is allocated.
“This is because since INEC has server,that result had gone into that server,and this server is under INEC control and custody, there is no reason why INEC will not make use of the authentic result in its server to avoid this broad day robbery that has been meted on the people of Kaduna State. That’s why we call the figures “allocated “.
He said while results were brought, you see the results changing but the figure in the INEC server remained authentic.
However, the PDP chairman wondered why INEC was not using the authentic result in the server in order to declare results, “so that everybody would feel comfortable”.