BY SEGUN ADEBAYO – Founding National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Chekwas Okorie, has warned that trusting the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to deliver free and credible elections in the Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi states will be suicidal and dangerous.
Accordingly, he has counseled governorship candidates in the off-season elections to ignore the so-called promises and assurances coming from the Electoral umpire.
“I venture to warn that it is risky and indeed suicidal to trust INEC. The trust deficit of the Commission is at an all-time low”, Okorie, who was APGA Presidential candidate in the February 25, 2023 election, said.
For him, it is safer and more reassuring for candidates to deploy their trusted agents in all the polling units as failure to do so would not only be most regrettable but obviously deprive them of electoral victories.
In a statement released on Friday and titled: “Candid advice to all governorship candidates for the November 11, 2023 elections in Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi states”, Okorie recalled how the evidence of polling unit results aided former Anambra State Governor, Peter Obi to claim his mandate from Dr Chris Ngige, after three years of pursuing the case in Court.
The elder statesman further said; “It cannot be over-emphasised that elections are won and lost at the Polling Units. Any candidate who has not planned to have polling agents at all the Polling Units (PUs) during elections has obviously planned to fail ab initio.
“The PU results entered and signed by the INEC Returning Officer and counter-signed by the designated Political Party Polling Agents on Forms EC8A are superior to whatever INEC may wish to upload on any of its platforms, whatever name called, whether BVAS or IREV. Two instances will suffice to support this assertion.
“In the 2003 governorship election in Anambra State, INEC declared Dr. Chris Ngige of the Peoples Democratic Party as the winner of the election. Mr. Peter Obi’s Director of Campaign, Hon. Dr. Okey Umeano, meticulously assembled and collated results returned by APGA Polling Agents from over 7,000 polling units in Anambra State.
“The aggregate result showed that Mr. Peter Obi clearly won the election. The weight of evidence was overwhelming and the Election Tribunal declared Peter Obi of APGA the winner of the election. Dr. Ngige’s incumbency advantage, including having a larger financial war chest and INEC complicity did not help him.”
The Septuagenarian said regrettably, two decades after that epic failure and disgraceful performance by the Commission in Anambra state, the same scenario repeated itself in Kogi State with Senator Natasha Apkoti-Uduaghan of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) relying on proofs from polling unit results to unseat Abubakar Ohere of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the court.
“About 20 years after, in 2023, Senator Natasha Apkoti-Uduaghan recovered her mandate as the elected Senator for the Kogi Central Senatorial District of Kogi State basically on the weight of the evidence of Polling Units results presented at the Election Petition Tribunal. Again, INEC’s conspiracy against her election failed.”
However urging politicians to always demonstrate the spirit of sportsmanship in electoral contests, Chief Okorie said; “I advise that candidates who have lost the election at the polls and are convinced that they lost having done their homework as prescribed here should show the gallantry of a sportsman and congratulate the winner. Similarly, the winner should demonstrate magnanimity in victory.”
In wishing that INEC’s conduct makes the off-cycle polls a smooth and hitch-free exercise, the Chief Okorie said; “I join other leaders and organisations that have prayed for peaceful elections in Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi States.”
It is on record that the 70-year-old statesman only returned to APGA recently after a long-drawn political battle saw him quitting the party years ago following irreconcilable differences with the then leadership of Senator Victor Umeh.
He thereafter formed and led the United Progressives Party (UPP) as its pioneer National Chairman from where he later defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
