• Describes it as charade, alleges collusion between Obiano, INEC
• Insists APGA’s carcass couldn’t have defeated APC
Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja
The candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the just concluded governorship election, Senator Andy Uba, has rejected the outcome of the election as declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Uba, in a statement issued Thursday by the spokesperson of the Senator Andy Uba Campaign Organisation, Mr. Jerry Ugokwe, described the outcome of the election as ‘charade’ and did not reflect the wishes of the people of Anambra State.
He said: “Our popular candidate, Senator Andy Uba, is a victim of widespread electoral fraud and manipulation by INEC in cohorts with the Willie Obiano regime and the security forces deployed to oversee the Anambra State governorship election.
“The elections were characterised by widespread irregularities, intimidation and voter suppression in order to clear the path for the inglorious ‘victory’ of APGA in the polls,” he said.
Uba lamented that in polling units where the Biometric Voters’ Accreditation System (BVAS) malfunctioned, INEC went ahead to conduct the elections manually.
He said there were numerous cases where votes announced by INEC exceeded the number of accredited voters in polling units.
The APC candidate alleged that a clear manifestation of collusion between the Obiano administration and INEC was the publishing of results on the social media handles of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) even before official announcement by INEC.
He added: “Yet mysteriously, the votes announced in advance by APGA always correspond correctly with the official figures released by INEC.
“It is inconceivable that our candidate, who polled over 200,000 votes in the APC primary election would be allocated a slightly above 43,000 votes by INEC.”
Uba noted that It was surprising that APGA that lost almost 80% of its stalwarts through defection to the APC before the election came out ‘victorious’.
He recalled that a sitting APGA Deputy Governor, seven members of the House of Representatives, 10 members of the Anambra State House of Assembly, the APGA party’s member of Board of Trustees, many serving special advisers, senior special advisers, as well as a serving PDP senator all defected to the APC very timely before the election, “yet APGA emerged ‘victorious’. This is quite ridiculous”.
Uba stated: “From all indications, the only people remaining in APGA at the time of the election were Governor Obiano and his household and a few staff of the Government House as well as Prof. Soludo and his household but majority of the electorate in Anambra State have moved to the APC.
“There was definitely no way the carcass of APGA could have defeated the APC without the active collusion and manipulation by INEC and the Obiano administration.”
Uba stressed that what happened on November 6, 2021 fell far below the acceptable standard of a free and fair election.
He said it could be best described as an electoral fraud perpetrated by the INEC, Obiano administration and the security forces.
Uba pointed out that starting from the appointment of INEC Ad hoc staff, who mostly came from Calabar, to the distribution of electoral materials and the retention of the Resident Electoral Commissioner, who supervised the second term election of Obiano, it was crystal clear that the game plan was to overturn the popular wishes of the people of Anambra State in the biggest electoral heist of all time in Nigeria’s political history.
He however called on his supporters to remain peaceful and calm, saying he would not relent in pursuing the ‘stolen electoral mandate’ to the limit of the law through all the constitutional means available.
Uba insisted that the facts on ground did not in any way reflect the outcome of the elections as announced by INEC.
