Accord Rejects Outcome Of Enugu Council Polls

One of the political parties that contested Saturday’s local government election in Enugu State, the Accord, Sunday, said it has rejected the outcome of the elections held across the 17 local government areas of the state.

Referring specifically to the chairmanship seats, which the Peoples Democratic Party won, the Accord said the outcome amounted to “the worst rape of democracy”.

The position of the party was contained in a statement signed by its state Chairman who also doubled as the chairmanship candidate of the party in Nkanu East LGA, Chief John Nwobodo.

According to him, “On Sunday, the Enugu State Independent Electoral Commission (ENSIEC) under the chairmanship of Prof Christian Ngwu committed what could be described as the worst rape of democracy. This absurdity it called election is a repeat of what obtained during the Stone Age before the advent of civilization.”

He accused ENSIEC of not acknowledging that his party was the only political party that conducted its primary election and submitted its list of candidates within the timeline of not later than 180 days as required under section 29 of the Electoral Act, 2022.

He stated that, “The significance of the timely submission of the list of candidates by Accord meant that the election should have been uncontested in favour of the party. However, out of sheer impunity, ENSIEC proceeded to conduct election, accommodating the PDP and other political parties who technically and legally were not candidates in the election.

“It is therefore concerning that ENSIEC declared and returned PDP candidates whose candidates emerged between 12th and 14th August, 2024, about 40 days to the election contrary to the provisions of the law. Sooner or later, the reality will dawn on PDP that the votes ascribed or credited to their candidates are wasted votes.”

On the election proper, Nwobodo said, “It can be best described as crazy and shameful. Election officials and materials arrived late in all the 4,145 polling units across the state. In some places, election started as late as 1pm. In most locations, the ad-hoc staff deployed for the election are card carrying members of the PDP.

“In most polling stations, the election officials did not come with polling unit result sheets, ENSIEC 8A and 8A(1). The opening procedures such as the display of the ballot boxes, cross checking of electoral materials with party agents were not observed. Equally, in most places there were no accreditation at all as ballot papers were issued to voters without verifying their names in the voter register.
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“Another funny aspect was the ballot paper deployed by ENSIEC. It was not only a blunder but a serious faux pax depicting the ignorance of the Commission and its officers of political and legal history. It was quite bizarre that ENSIEC wasted tax payers’ money to print ballot papers containing a list of 92 political parties, a mix extant and extinct political parties in Nigeria.

“We may need to enlighten ENSIEC that 72 of those political parties on the ballot paper were deregistered by INEC in February, 2020 over four years ago. With the mixture of living and dead political parties on the ballot paper comes a big blight on the election eroding its integrity which it does not possess any way. Therefore, on that score, the election was conducted for dead political entities.
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“Again, in Nkanu East and Isi-Uzo LGAs, the candidates of the PDP allegedly elected had served as both appointed and elected chairmen of their respective councils in two previous tenures which disqualified them from being part of the election.”

He added that the non-use of BVAS for accreditation of voters in the election made the election null and void, adding that “The incredible numbers being churned out in favour of the candidates of the PDP was only possible because ENSIEC deliberately avoided deploying BVAS.”

He referred to Nkanu East, where the candidate of PDP, Hon Sydney Okechukwu Edeh, scored 28,417 votes, noting that, “It was indeed childish to come up with such bloated figure in an election that witnessed the poorest voter turnout ever.”

He expressed confidence that his party would get justice through the judiciary