The Peoples Democratic Party in Plateau has accused the Plateau State Independent Electoral Commission (PLASIEC) of making moves to manipulate the local government elections in favour of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
A statement issued by the PDP publicity secretary, John Akans said the party has it on good authority that results of the local government election have already been written by officials of PLASIEC under the supervision of APC.
It stated that, “hours after elections should have started today, result sheets have not been given to the electoral officers at the various polling units. Rather, only duplicated written results have been dispatched to the polling units. This is a heinous plot hatched by the APC in collaboration with PLASIEC.”
The statement described the action as the desperation of the Governor Lalong government to grab and retain power at all costs and stressed the what is happening in the 13 local government areas was an extension of “APC’s already existing imposed local government officials on the people.”
“We saw this coming and that was why the PDP challenged PLASIEC’s impunity in court when it started implementing its rigging plans by appointing Electoral Officers outside the commission contratry to section 2 of PLASIEC Law which defines the appointment of an electoral officer as a staff of the commission,” the statement reads.
It further stated that PLASIEC had completely discredited and disqualified itself from standing as an unbiased umpire and called on the people of the state to reject what it described as “impunity being perpetrated by the PLASIEC Chairman and the APC.”
PLASIEC Chairman Fabian Ntung did not answer calls to his phone but APC Secretary, Bashiru Musan Sati told Daily Trust that the PDP was only displaying a defeatist attitude knowing that it would lose the elections.
Sati said, “we were all there with the PDP and other parties at PLASIEC and we counted all the non sensitive and then sensitive materials, but no one complained. They were there when the materials were distributed local government by local government and after the exercise, every political party was given the opportunity to comment but for anyone to now come up with such allegations when the election is ongoing shows an attempt to create confusion. We know it is because they have seen that they are going to lose but let them take it in good faith it is only a game. “
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