Osun Rerun: PDP Heads To Court Over INEC’s Declaration, As Protesters Storm INEC Office.
By Emmanuel Adeniran
OSOGBO – The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) says it is heading to the court to quash the declaration of the September 22nd, 2018 Osun State Governorship Election as inconclusive by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
In a statement issued on Monday by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr. Kola Ologbondiyan, the PDP insisted that the polls had already been concluded and results announced in all polling units and collation centers, thus bringing the exercise to its lawful conclusion and removing INEC’s powers to declare the election inconclusive.
The statement read in part, that “our electoral law is clear that once an election result is declared, INEC is bound to return a winner”.
“INEC, in trying to play the card of the defeated All Progressives Congress (APC), contravened the law by refusing to announce a return, even when the declared results have thrown up a winner”.
“Section 69 of the Electoral Act 2010 (as amended) states that inter-alia “in an election to the office of the President or governor whether or not contested and in any contested election to any other elective office, the result shall be ascertained by counting the votes cast for each candidate and subject to the provisions of sections 133, 134 and 179 of the constitution, the candidate that receives the highest number of votes shall be declared elected by the appropriate Returning Officer”.
“Concurrently, Section 179 (2), (a) (b) of the constitution directly prescribes that “a candidate for an election to the office of Governor of a State shall be deemed to have been duly elected where, there being two or more candidates – (a) he has the highest number of votes cast at the election; and (b) he has not less than one-quarter of all the votes cast in each of at least two-thirds of all the local government areas in the State”.
The PDP also demanded the immediate arrest and prosecution of the Returning Officer in the election, Professor Joseph Fuwape.
Professor Joseph Funwape is the current Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology (FUTA) in Akure.
According to the Party, by declaring the result inconclusive, Fuwape had succumbed to the pressures of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
It said, “INEC’s action in declaring a concluded election as inconclusive is therefore an annulment, totally duplicitous, constitutionally illegal, ultra-vires and as such null and void”.
“The PDP therefore demands the immediate arrest and prosecution of the Osun State Governorship Election Returning Officer, Prof. Joseph Fuwape, for succumbing to the pressure of the APC and declaring a decided election as inconclusive”.
It also called on the INEC Chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu to immediately do the needful by declaring Senator Adeleke the winner.
Meanwhile, protesters on Monday stormed the headquarters of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Osogbo, the Osun State capital, to protest against the rerun declared by the electoral body.
“Protesters with different placards inscriptions spoke with journalists said the mandate of the PDP candidate was stolen and must be restored for peace to reign. They added that a rerun is a total waste of time because the people of Osun had already spoken with their votes.
The Chairman of the Osun state Chapter of the Conference of Registered Political Parties (CPP), Adekunle Rufai Omoaje, called on INEC to have a rethink on the decision.
He said, “INEC has no right to declare the votes concluded by the electorates as inconclusive”.
“The young and old in Osun chose Ademola Adeleke as their Governor-elect. We are calling on INEC to have a rethink and declare the people’s choice as the winner”.
He added that the history of the June 12th, 1993 election should not be allowed to repeat itself in the State. INEC had declared the election inconclusive because of the cancellation of results and snatching of ballot boxes at some polling units in Ife North, Ife south, Orolu and Osogbo local government areas.
According to the electoral body, the number of cancelled votes were higher than the margin between the two top candidates. Senator Adeleke led the race with 254,698 votes, 353 votes more than his closest rival, Gboyega Oyetola of the All Progressives Congress who scored 254,345 votes.
The margin was, however, less than the 3,498 votes in the polling units where voting was cancelled.
Consequently, a rerun has been scheduled to hold on Thursday 27th, September 2018.
