The Labour Party has accused the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of malpractice in collating results for the Presidential and National Assembly elections on February 27. The National Chairman of the Labour Party, Julius Abure, made the allegations at a news conference to address the serious concerns arising from the election. Abure stated that INEC’s conduct had left Nigerians, particularly the youths who participated in the election, feeling disappointed and disillusioned.
Abure pointed out that the Electoral Act was amended in 2022 to allow for the electronic transmission of results after they were declared at the polling units. Nigerians participated in the election believing that the use of technology and adherence to the agreed electronic transmission of results to INEC servers at polling units would ensure free, fair, and transparent elections. However, Abure claimed that the process was truncated on Saturday, February 25th, 2023, and that the INEC servers shut down, preventing the upload of the presidential election results onto the server.
The Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) also did not work as planned, according to Abure. This failure, he said, gave room for manipulation of the presidential results being announced by the INEC Chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, at the Collation Centre in Abuja. Abure also claimed that sufficient documentary evidence confirmed that manipulations of the presidential election results occurred in Lagos, Rivers, Imo, parts of Edo State, Delta State, and some Northern States. He added that these manipulations were carried out under the watchful eyes and connivance of police officers at the various election units and INEC offices.
Abure concluded by calling on President Muhammadu Buhari, who promised Nigerians a legacy of free, fair, and credible elections, to ensure that the election results reflected the actual voting results obtained at polling units across the country. The Labour Party and its presidential candidates would not accept any results that did not uphold the people’s wishes.
