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From Godwin Tsa, Abuja
Middle Belt Forum (MBF) has called for the resignation of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Mahmood Yakubu following the controversy that has trailed the outcome of the presidential election.
This is as the group commended the presidential candidates of the PDP, Atiku Abubakar and LP, Peter Obi for deciding to seek redress in court.
National President of the group, Dr. Pogu Bitrus, in a statement, yesterday, said the region supported that candidacy of Peter Obi based on the sense of justice, equity and fair play. He commended the men and women, particularly within the Middle Belt enclaves and FCT, who voted the LP candidate to ensure justice prevailed in the country.
He, however, expressed displeasure over INEC’s poor conduct of the presidential and National Assembly polls despite assurances to electorate.
“We express great disappointment in the collation officers that took charge of 8,816 Wards, 774 LGAs and the 37 States who, instead of strengthening the institution, only made a mockery of themselves.”
Bitrus said should Yakubu failed to resign, President Muhammadu Buhari should sack him.
“We call on INEC chairman, Prof Mahmood Yakubu to toe the honourable path by resigning his position before the next election. His frittering away of tens of billions of Naira on a technology that he did not intend to use, makes him unfit to continue to maintain his position. In the event that Yakubu fails to tender his resignation after this press release, President Muhammadu Buhari should summarily sack him. We pray that the inaction by Mr. President and the presidency will not be seen as complicit in the subversion of the will of Nigerians in the electoral heist of 25th February, 2023, a preposition we will prefer not to be correct.”
Bitrus tasked the judiciary to remain apolitical and uncompromising as political parties and candidates head to the Election Petition Tribunal to trash out their grievances at the polls.
“We wish to advise that the courts should act at all times in a manner that their decisions will not be seen as subverting the will of the people as many Nigerians point at the Uzodinma and Machina cases as decisions they cannot understand. Apart from the brazen refusal by INEC to comply with its own guidelines, the Electoral Act and the constitution, the conduct of the commission on election day was fraught with deliberately orchestrated logistical challenges, as shown by the late arrival of materials as well as INEC staff at polling units, harassment of voters in opposition strongholds to suppress votes, fraudulent thumb printing of ballot papers by INEC officials leading to the death of an INEC staff at Lugbe, in the FCT, among other infractions.”
On why the group supported Obi, MBF said. “the basis of the support of the peoples of the Middle Belt for Mr. Peter Obi, in the last presidential election was in line with our sense of justice, equity and fair play. The shared understanding by the political elite in Nigeria that presidential power oscillates between southern and northern Nigeria had ensured that the South West and the South South geo-political zones had been in the saddle at the presidential level at different times since the return of civil rule in May 1999, leaving out only the South East.”
