Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt
The Accord governorship candidate in Rivers State, Dumo Lulu-Briggs, has rejected the outcome of the governorship and House of Assembly polls in the state and called for the cancellation of the elections.
Lulu-Briggs, who made this call yesterday while addressing journalists at the party’s secretariat in Port Harcourt, said the party will challenge the outcome of the election in court if the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) does not revert the result allegedly allocated to the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the state.
He stated that the election was marred with violence, snatching of ballot boxes, killings, manipulation of election results, police and thugs intimidation on the electorate among others.
According to him, the outcome of the February 25 presidential and National Assembly was responsible for voter apathy in the state.
He alleged that thugs working for the PDP hijacked the electoral process in most of the 6,866 polling units in the state and thwarted the electronic transmission of results.
The Accord standard bearer in the March 18, 2023, said INEC allegedly failed to meet their mandate in the election process, accusing them of conniving with the ruling party in the state to thwart the people’s will.
“In the last couple of days, the Rivers State Executive Committee of Accord, members of my campaign council, my running mate and I have painstakingly evaluated the governorship and House of Assembly elections of March 18, 2023.
“Based on INEC’s assurances, Rivers people came out in their numbers on March 18, 2023 to elect a new governor and new members of the state House of Assembly but instead of ballot papers, they were served with various degrees of violence that resulted in deaths, bodily harm and destruction of properties.
“They wanted a change, a redirection of their beloved state. But political thugs, gunmen and unscrupulous state security agents unleashed violence and bloodshed on them. As it were, the violence of 2015 and 2019 has repeated itself. Again, the blood of our innocent compatriots has been used to water the ambition of desperate Rivers State politicians.”
Lulu-Briggs revealed that days before the elections, Accord House of Assembly members were kidnapped, harassed.
“The residence of Miss Nenubari Princess Nlenwa, the House of Assembly candidate of Accord in Tai Constituency was surrounded on the eve of the election by 30 men dressed in police uniforms. Their mission was to pick and lock her up and stop her from physically participating in an election in which she was a candidate. She escaped through the backdoor and spent the night in the forest.”
He also informed that “local government chairmen were asked to write their resignation letters in order to coerce them into delivering their LGAs at all cost to the PDP or lose their jobs. Traditional rulers were also made to adopt the governorship candidate of the PDP.”
He said ahead of the elections, all the polls indicated he was a topmost contender, reason he was invited to all the debates for topmost governorship candidates. “On election day, I got feedback on how well I was performing but my votes were changed by the PDP in most of the places that I won.
“There was no proper governorship and House of Assembly elections in Rivers State on March 18, 2023. The exercise was marred and disrupted by killings, massive violence, heavy voter suppression, voters’ intimidation and other forms of irregularities and non-compliance with the electoral law and INEC regulations.
“It was characterised by vote buying, result forgery, result sheet mutilation, serial thumb printing, etc. These happened not just substantially but on an excessive and systemic scale.
“In the light of the above and lest the dead die in vain, I call on INEC to cancel the entire elections of March 18, 2023 in Rivers State and hold a fresh governorship and House of Assembly elections. Failure to heed this call will leave my party and me no choice but to file a petition at the election tribunal to challenge this travesty,” Lulu-Briggs added.
