The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has asked the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to resign over “confession” by two INEC Commissioners; Festus Okoye and Haruna Mohammed on Wednesday, that the “card readers were circumvented” in elections conducted by the commission.
The party, in a statement on Thursday by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, said the “confession” was an admission that the November 16 governorship elections in Kogi and Bayelsa states as well as the Kogi West senatorial polls were rigged.
The party said no matter how much falsehood appears to thrive, the truth will always catch up with it.
The PDP argued that the confession by the commission vindicated its position and the majority of Nigerians that there were manipulations, alterations and circumventing of genuine data captured by the card readers and that actual results transmitted from polling units were tampered with.
“While calling on Nigerians to remain calm, the PDP charges Prof. Yakubu and the INEC leadership under him to do the needful by vacating offices to save our electoral system from complete collapse.
“It is indeed unfortunate that INEC can suddenly claim that it has just realized that the card readers have lost steam in our electoral process after they have been used to manipulate voting processes.
“Prof. Yakubu is now faced with the burden of how our electoral system has been corrupted by the manipulations in his INEC, all in the bid to serve group, rather than national interest.
“The INEC Chairman should accept his failures and vacate office without further delay. This is because there is no way Nigerians can continue to repose confidence in the commission under his watch,” the PDP insisted.