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From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa
Governor of Bayelsa State Douye Diri has said the state’s governorship election petition tribunal, which sat in Abuja, exposed the electoral fraud perpetrated by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the November 11, 2023 poll in the state, Chief Timipre Sylva, the party’s chairman and a serving Commissioner of Police.
Diri who was received at the Bayelsa State Airport by a mammoth crowd and proceeded to the King of Glory Chapel in Government House, Yenagoa, where he stopped for thanksgiving upon his arrival from Abuja disclosed that APC and their witnesses shot themselves in the legs with frivolous claims and inconsistent exhibits.
A statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Daniel Alabrah narrated how a former Commissioner of Police in the state, Mr. Tolani Alausa, who was procured as a star witness in the case, tainted his image by tendering false evidence before the court and was humiliated for parading fake INEC documents.
He noted that although Mr Alausa was no longer the CP in the state, the senior police officer presented himself at the tribunal to defend the fraud perpetrated by the APC candidate.
Governor Diri also said the tribunal equally excoriated the party’s chairman in the state, Chief Dennis Otiotio, for his “unprofessional conduct” being a legal practitioner.
He called on the judiciary to place heavy sanctions on frivolous matters and abuse of court processes by those desperate to subvert the wishes of the people.
He said: “During one of the sittings, I physically went to the tribunal and I saw what transpired. Our party’s secretary, in the witness box, stated that most of the election materials the APC presented as INEC’s documents before the court were manufactured by the APC state chairman, Dennis Otiotio.
“To confirm this, our lawyers scanned an INEC form that they (APC) presented and it was established that the form was printed in Yenagoa. The counsel to INEC in his own cross-examination of Otiotio and their party’s witnesses said all INEC result sheets had barcodes but that presented as result sheets by the APC had none.
“We also witnessed how a Commissioner of Police made himself an APC commissioner in the state. This was an officer that had been transferred from the state following an indictment by the IG due to a misdemeanour but he got his way back through the APC candidate’s influence to supervise the election. The same person became the APC star witness in a case he was no longer party to, following his re-deployment out of the state.
“If you look at the veracity of our matter, you will know that it was between light and darkness. Technically, they were even knocked out by the tribunal and their case was dismissed. But the panel did not only base their judgment on that. Rather the judges addressed their points one by one. So we are waiting for their appeal.”
Diri described the litigation process by Sylva as a deceptive plot by those who attempted to steal in broad daylight and still crying wolf about a miscarriage of justice by the tribunal.
The Bayelsa helmsman stressed that his mandate to govern the state was given by God and anyone still desperate to subvert the will of God and the people will end up in a wild goose chase.
