INEC committee never met with us – Rivers APC

The All Progressives Congress in Rivers State has expressed surprise that the committee set up by the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Attahiru Jega, to investigate the conduct of the presidential and National Assembly elections in the state failed to meet with it.

The APC had complained to INEC over alleged disenfranchisement of its supporters and manipulation of the result of the March 28, 2015 elections in the state.

State Chairman of the APC, Dr. Davies Ikanya, said on Sunday that the committee, set up by Jega, only met with INEC and the Peoples Democratic Party in the state, who were supposed to be the offenders in the matter.

Ikanya queried the rationale behind Jega’s claim that a committee was set-up to investigate complaints on the non-conduct of elections in the state when the said committee had not been able to meet with the party that made the complaint.

He said, “We (Rivers APC) are amazed to hear that the purported committee had come to Rivers State as it expected that an investigative or fact finding committee, such as was said to have been constituted. would certainly have met with the complainants and other concerned parties before taking a decision.

“The APC is even more surprised to hear that the said investigative committee only met with Gesila Khan, Rivers Resident Electoral Commissioner in whom it (APC) long lost confidence in and perhaps the PDP, being principally the two parties, whose misconduct during the botched elections, the said committee was meant to investigate.

“We wonder how an investigative committee would hear only from one side particularly the main accused and culprit who will naturally deny their illegal acts. Let me say emphatically that the committee set-up by INEC to investigate the Rivers election case did not meet with us.”

Ikanya, however, disclosed that contrary to Godsday Orubebe’s unwarranted outburst, he (Ikanya) personally submitted his party’s petition to INEC and not by email, insisting that even Orubebe and ‘his co-travelers’ know that there was no elections in the state.

“Though the party understands that out of the abundance of caution, Jega admitted the charade called elections in Rivers State, the peoples’ rights would not be sacrificed illegally,” he added.

The state APC chairman recalled that political parties in Rivers had unanimously declared that the purported election was a mockery of democracy because, according to them, the PDP in concert with the REC, marred the entire process with high momentum of irregularities, malpractices and killings.

“Even a child will not believe that a state like Rivers, controlled by the APC, that the party (APC) will record less down 70,000 votes as against the opposition’s over 1.4 million votes,” Ikanya said.