Bauchi guber: Surrender people’s mandate, Dogara challenges Gov Abubakar

Paul Orude, Bauchi

Following the inconclusive governorship election declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC in Bauchi State, Speaker, House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, has called on the incumbent governor of the state, Mohammed Abubakar, to surrender the mandate of the people at this point that he has already lost the election.

Dogara who was flanked by the PDP governorship candidate, Bala Mohammed, the state party chairman and other party stalwarts at the NUJ secretariat on Monday in Bauchi, alleged that the cancellation of election in Tafawa Balewa local government by the state returning officer, Professor Mohammed Kyari, was illegal and orchestrated to oppress the people of the state.

Dogara alleged that the governor had on several occasions referred to him as a light-weight politician whose constituency could only deliver nothing more than 70,000 votes, adding that Governor Abubakar boasted that he won his election in 2015 with 300,000 votes and did not need a single vote from Tafawa Balewa local government to become governor.

“I want the media to ask the governor: will it therefore not amount to an act of unprecedented shamelessness for him to go now to Tafawa Balewa, my constituency with only 70,000 votes that he does not require, to go and campaign for their votes or to illegally source votes from there, to make up and become a governor?

“If there is any honour on his part, having declared that he doesn’t need one single vote from there, I think, honour demands that he should surrender at this point that he has lost this election,” he said

The speaker alleged that apart from the illegal cancellation, INEC in the state was still sourcing for other units that it would cancel even after it had collated and declared the results as it is not sure of what will happen in Tafawa Balewa during the supplementary election.

Dogara said that the election was peaceful, free and fair at the unit level as attested to by the local government returning officer, alleging that they only challenge they encountered was that political thugs of Governor Abubakar invaded the local government collation centre and carted away some result sheets.

He called on INEC Chairman, Mahmoud Yakubu to intervene in the election crisis rocking the state, saying that declaration of inconclusive election in the state by INEC was a brazen rape of the mandate of Bauchi State.