APC, BONNY CHAPTER
PRESS STATEMENT
CANCELLATION OF ELECTIONS IN BONNY: OUR OWN SIDE OF THE STORY
The attention of APC, Bonny Chapter, has been drawn to media stunts by the Peoples Democratic Party, Bonny chapter, especially the ones credited to the chairman of Bonny Local Government Council, Hon. David Irimagha, in which the unfortunate election-related incident of yesterday was blamed on the APC and its leader in Bonny, Hon. George Fubara Tolofari.
In an interview he granted a Radio Station, the Bonny Local government council chairman, in a litany of lies and fabrications, accused Hon. George Tolofari of using thugs to stop the election.
We wish to state categorically clear that in those media stunts, the PDP and Hon. David Irimagha have deliberately elected to distort facts just to demonize the APC, and ingloriously secure the underserved support and sympathy of Bonny people and residents. This, unfortunately, is coming from a collective of betrayers who recently sold Bonny and her people out to Degema for a pittance.
What really transpired was that as we all know, Presidential and National Assembly elections were scheduled to hold on Saturday, February 23, 2019 across the country, including Bonny. The elections were to be conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) which is represented here in Bonny by the Electoral Officer (E.O) Mr. Eze Amadi.
It happened that we received report from an impeccable authority that the Electoral Officer, Mr. Eze Amadi, held a secret nocturnal meeting with the chairman of Bonny Local Government Council and other stalwarts of PDP where they turned out the lights and discussed in the dark. Such a meeting would never be in the interest of APC.
As a political party, it would be foolhardy of us to ignore such report and just move on as if nothing had happened.
In the morning of the election day, we were at INEC office as usual for the normal disbursement of materials. But to our consternation, the Electoral Officer, who should superintendent the process, was nowhere to be found. All the calls put across to him by some of us and even staffs of INEC were ignored.
Every honest person would agree that such behaviour in the morning of presidential and national assembly elections would engender suspicion.
For that reason, nobody would blame APC for suspecting foul play since the Electoral Officer has already created doubts in our minds.
So, when he arrived from the government lodge where he was spotted, we now requested that to assuage our doubts about his neutrality and forthrightness, he has to convince us about the authenticity of sensitive materials (especially result sheets) before we could go for the voting. This was a very sincere request which any honest person would have obliged.
But to our greatest surprise, the Electoral Officer, Mr. Eze Amadi, rebuffed our request. He said he could not confirm that the result sheets to be used in the elections were not fake.
Those who are not deeply-rooted in this game of politics may not understand our position. If election is held, no matter how transparent the process has been, if the results are entered on fake results sheets, everything has been rendered a nullity. The people with the original result sheets have been given the leeway to decide the outcome of the election.
So it is not a crime to insist on the fidelity of elections we are participating in.
Having said that he did not have the knowledge to confirm whether the result sheets were genuine or fake, we demanded that he should take them to Port Harcourt for confirmation. This was the only condition we peacefully and nonviolently maintained before elections could commence. Members of APC present at INEC were not armed whatsoever, neither did they exhibit any violent conduct.
We were shocked when the Chairman of Bonny Local government council, Hon. David Irimagha came with already mobilized, well armed thugs of PDP to come and unleash mayhem and brutalize APC members.
As they began to terrorize the environment, the military personnel swiftly rose to the occasion and repelled them. In that unfortunate mêlée, some people sustained various degrees of injuries.
The thugs proceeded to APC secretariat and mindlessly vandalised our insignia and destroyed valuables.
Let us remind the public that this was not the first time a political party had raised a protest over the authenticity of result sheets.
In 2016, during the rerun elections, the Peoples Democratic Party raised a similar protest even when voting had begun. The process was called off and the election rescheduled.
It would not take a different narrative now because APC was involved. No party would fold its arms and watch the other party shortchange and rig it out. APC did what it should do in that circumstance.
The blame should go to the executive chairman of Bonny Local Government Council, Hon. David Irimagha, who apart from luring the Electoral Officer, Mr. Eze Amadi, into compromising the integrity of the elections, still had the effrontery to mobilize thugs to unleash terror on harmless people of Bonny. He should desist from trying to divert attention by casting blame on an innocent man like Hon. George Fubara Tolofari.
We hereby call on the Commissioner of Police, Rivers State, to warn the executive chairman to desist from acting as the chief security officer of INEC. We thank the military personnel for their timely intervention intervention which prevented a catastrophe.
We have in recent times drawn the attention of the public to the negative dimension the PDP wants to introduce into Bonny political landscape. This mindset that there is no other political party in Bonny has led many of their members into violent disposition towards members of APC.
On a sober note, the All Progressives Congress deeply sympathizes with those who sustained injuries during the fracas and wishes them quick recovery.
We wish to state that the APC is a very responsible party with coolheaded members which aligns with the wishes and aspirations of the people. It was never the intention of APC to deprive the good people and residents of Bonny of their franchise. As a political party going into a contest, we only demanded that a level playing field should be created for all.
As it stands now, there was no election in Bonny as confirmed by INEC. We hope that new date for the election will be announced soon. And we sincerely hope that those suspicious relationships and nocturnal meetings that contributed to the present stalemate will not be allowed to rear their ugly heads again.
Signed:
For APC, Bonny Chapter,
Adolf Ransom Pepple,
Publicity Secretary.
24/02/2019.
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