The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State, Tony Cole, has said that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is not cooperating with him, as he demanded for the certified copies of the Rivers State governorship election results.
Tony Cole stated this during an interview on Channels TV’s Politics Today.
The APC and its candidate in the March 18 governorship election in Rivers are planning to seek redress at election tribunal in the state.
On Thursday some members of the PDP and the APC were injured when they clashed some metres away from INEC office in Rivers State.
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Cole has since accused the ruling PDP of using thugs to disperse his supporters, saying many of them including him and some key APC memberswere injured in the process.
Cole said, “We have not received the cooperation we were expecting from INEC at all. I have no idea why INEC has been silent when we are trying to gather information.
“I was not able to reach any INEC official of reasonable office to let us know what is going on. My people are getting frustrated. The last time I went to INEC on Friday, we met a lowly officer in the legal department, who told me he does not know what was going on, that he he had no power to respond.”
Speaking on the matter, Mr. Rotimi Oyekanmi, the Chief Press Secretary to the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, told Daily Trust that the commission has nothing to hide as a law-abiding organisation.
According to him, the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Rivers, Johnson Sinikiem, had refuted his (Cole’s) allegation.
According to him, the REC said he spoke with Cole on Friday, and promised that they would meet in the office on Monday (yesterday).
He explained that unfortunately, PDP also came to protest to demand a certified true copy of the election results and joint inspection of election materials.
Oyekanmi added that the Rivers State REC said on Saturday and Sunday, he responded to Cole’s calls on the clarification the police needed to release those arrested on the allegations of forged election documents.
He said that the REC promptly did that and the police released them.
Mr. Sinikiem also said that earlier Tuesday, INEC HOD spoke to Cole’s lawyer to come for an interface with him on the CTC processes.
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