Rivers PDP lauds INEC, urges IGP to emulate army chief
Memoye Oghu, Port-Harcourt
The Rivers state chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has commended the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) over its decision on the suspended governorship and House of Assembly elections in the state, saying that it accepts the pronouncements of INEC as substantial representation of the true state of the electoral process before the suspension.
The party also lauded the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai for setting up a committee to probe the conduct of soldiers deployed to the state during the elections and urged the Inspector General of the Police, Abubakar Adamu to take a cue from the army chief to do same for the F-SARS operatives.
State chairman of the party, Felix Obuah, at a press briefing at the weekend in Port Harcourt, commended Lt. Gen. Buratai for inaugurating the Major-General T.A . Gagariga’s led committee to probe the allegations of misconduct, including the assassination attempt on our Governor, Nyesom Wike by soldiers during the general elections.
“We wish to assure the chief of army staff that the PDP will appear, present and prove before the committee with facts and evidence of the atrocities committed by soldiers against the electoral process and the people of Rivers state before, during and after the general elections,” Obuah stated.
He urged the inspector general to institute a similar panel to probe the brazen involvement of the state Commander of F-SARS, Akin Fakorode and his gang of police operatives in the organized invasion of polling units, collation centers, abduction of electoral officers and the shooting and killing of innocent persons during the general elections at Khana, Gokana, Ikwerre, Eleme, Tai, Oyigbo and Ogu Bolo Local Governments.
After recalling why INEC suspended the electoral processes in the state on March 10 and its decision on the findings of its fact-finding committee, the PDP chairman commended the INEC for standing by the truth and for its courage and principled determination to ensure that the votes of the people as freely and overwhelmingly expressed in favour of the PDP count.
“However, we wish to draw the INEC’s attention to the fact that in addition to the 17 local government areas with fully collated results, the election also successfully held and results declared at the unit and ward levels in five of
the six other local government areas where full collation of results is still pending,” added.
It would be recalled that INEC suspended all electoral processes in the state and set up a fact-finding committee to investigate the manifest disruption of the collation of results by the army and the Federal-State Anti-Robbery Squad (F-SARS)
After a thorough and holistic review of the report and findings of its committee, INEC in a release on March 15 gave its verdict, saying that it has the complete collated results of the elections in 17 local government areas of the state in safe custody.
