The All Progressives Congress (APC) yesterday raised the alarm over
plans to rig the general elections by the Peoples Democratic Party
(PDP), using what it described as the “Modified Ekiti Rigging Strategy”.
The party urged foreign election observers and the international
community to beam a searchlight on the electoral process, stressing that
the ruling party cannot be trusted.
APC National Publicity Secretary Alhaji Lai Mohammed told reporters
in Lagos that PDP chieftains are working round the clock to manipulate
the elections because the ruling party is not popular.
He said: “It is no longer news that a Captain in the Nigerian Army,
Sagir Koli, has exposed how the administration used the military to rig
the governorship election in Ekiti on June 21st 2014. According to Capt.
Sagir, soldiers were put at the behest of designated PDP officials at
each of the 16 local governments to work with the officials to rig the
elections.
“Once the PDP officials pointed out any APC leader in a particular
local government, such leader was either arrested and detained or simply
hounded into hiding. APC leaders who were arrested also had the funds
in their possession, including money to pay party agents and for other
logistics, confiscated as they were detained till well after the
election.
“We have additional information to give you on what has now become
Ekitigate. Contrary to the general belief, it was not just the military
that was involved. It was the entire gamut of the nation’s security
agencies; the police, the State Security Service (SSS) and the Civil
Defence. They were all constituted into a task force that was deployed
to each local government and placed under the command of the PDP.
“We have the names of all the servicemen involved in the criminal
act, as well as their service and telephones numbers. On the morning of
the Ekiti election, not one APC leader was a free man or woman. They
were either in detention, in hiding or on the run, because the task
force carried out its duty with brutal efficiency.”
Mohammed alleged that plans were underway to modify the strategy used
to rig the Ekiti election, following public outcry over the “show of
shame”.
He said, since it had become old-fashioned to use the military for
the illegal act, PDP chieftains were sewing military and police uniforms
for thugs, who will be instigated to create confusion during the
exercise.
Mohammed stressed: “A large number of uniformed personnel on election
day will be those donning fake uniforms and ranks, and their mandate
will be to rig for the PDP and terrorise opposition members and
supporters.
“They have also mobilised ethnic militias across the country; MASSOB
in the Southeast; the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC) in the Southwest and
ex-militants in the Niger Delta. Mobilised under the pretext of a N9
billion pipeline contract, the marching order given to the ethnic
militias is to destabilise the election in their respective regions,
thus rendering it inconclusive. The highly disruptive and armed protest
by the OPC in Lagos last Monday was a dress rehearsal for the plot.”
The Publicity Secretary said thugs have been trained in the
Southwest,particularly Ondo and Ogun states, to disrupt the elections.
Urging the security agencies to rise to the occasion, Mohammed said:
“In Ondo State, training was organised by the PDP leadership in
Ilaje/Okitipupa zone. These thugs, numbering over 300, were given two
weeks training in weapons use under a Commander/President called Miti.
They have now been moved in 12 buses to join the Ogun State Group from
where they will be dispatched to other states in the Southwest, with
arms.
“For the Northern part of the country, the plot is to deploy the
Special Forces, who were trained in Belarus, to the liberated
territories in the Northeast, ostensibly to hold the liberated
territories. But, in reality, they are to rig the election for the PDP.
Also, Vice President Namadi Sambo has met with security chiefs in Kaduna
with a request that they must deliver 2 million votes to the PDP
anyhow, with promises of mouth-watering incentives include cash and
promotion.”
The party official alleged that the Inspector-General of Police and
the Service Chiefs are also part of the plot to rig the elections.
He recalled that the Inspector-General has issued a strange and
unlawful warning to voters to cast their votes and leave the polling
units.
Mohammed said a similar order is expected to be issued by the Chief
of Army Staff, ahead of the election, in a bid to harass and intimidate
voters.
Urging voters to ignore unlawful directives, which are not supported
by the Electoral Act, he said voters are free to defend their votes
without disrupting the electoral process.
Mohammed added: “Without being disruptive, they should use their
phone cameras to document proceedings at the various polling booths so
that no one will tamper with their votes. All they are required to do is
to conduct themselves peacefully.
“We will not accept accept a repeat of the Ekiti rigging strategy in
any form, modified or not. Voters must not be harassed or intimidated
and they must be allowed to defend their votes, as supported by the
Electoral Act. Those who are bent on rigging the elections must know
that Nigeria will be under a global spotlight on election day. No
polling booth, no matter where it is located, will escape that
spotlight.”
Mohammed thanked the United States and Britain for their commitment
to free, fair, credible and violence-free polls in Nigeria as
demonstrated in the article jointly written by US Secretary of State
John Kerry and British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Phillip
Hammond.
He said: “We at the APC associate ourselves with that timely article
in which the authors urged ‘all eligible Nigerians to vote, resist those
who attempt to incite violence, and to come together as one country to
defend the country against terrorist threats.
“Those planning to disrupt or rig the elections and instigate
violence should heed the warning signals from the international
community, as aptly conveyed by Mr. John Kerry and Mr Phillip Hammond,
that ‘any person who incites violence at any stage in the electoral
process, or who seeks power through unconstitutional means, should be
held accountable and should understand that the consequences will be
severe, both domestically and internationally.”
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