The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused the All Progressives Congress (APC) of exerting pressure on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Edo State, Anugbum Onuoha, to suspend the collation of results from Saturday’s governorship election.
In a statement by PDP spokesperson Debo Ologunagba, the party alleged that the APC is attempting to influence both the INEC Chairman and the Edo REC to halt the collation process in order to manipulate the INEC Portal and replace the legitimate polling unit results with fabricated figures in favor of the APC.
“Intelligence available to the PDP indicates that the APC is pressuring the INEC Chairman and the Edo State REC to suspend the collation process, creating an opportunity to manipulate the results from polling units with fabricated figures benefiting the APC,” Ologunagba said.
The PDP called on INEC to resist any undue influence and safeguard the integrity of the results from the polling units. The party further accused the APC of pressuring military officials to withdraw, allowing APC-backed armed thugs to disrupt and manipulate the collation process.
The PDP warned that Edo State residents already have access to the authentic results from polling units and that any attempt to alter them could trigger serious consequences.
“INEC and the APC must understand that any effort to alter the results of the Edo State governorship election will lead to severe consequences. The people are prepared to protect their votes by any legal means, including legitimate physical confrontation if necessary,” the statement continued.
Meanwhile, INEC has uploaded over 98% of the polling unit result sheets to its Result Viewing Portal (IReV). As of 2:00 a.m. on Sunday, results from 4,435 out of 4,519 polling units had been posted.
Although 17 candidates are running for the governorship, political analysts describe the contest as a three-horse race between Asue Ighodalo of the PDP, Monday Okpebholo of the APC, and Olumide Akpata of the Labour Party.