Written By Chukwudi Ogana

Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose has condemned the tribunal judgments which nullified the governorship elections in Rivers and Akwa Ibom States.

Governor Fayose expressed concern over what he described as an attempt by President Buhari and his party, to fraudulently take over control of the South-South states.

“The seeming collaboration between the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led Federal Government and a section of the judiciary is worrisome and portends grave danger to the corporate existence of Nigeria. This is worse than corruption that the president claims to be fighting.”

Governor Fayose alleged that this desperation is to take over Rivers and Akwa Ibom states, in preparation for 2019.

In a Press Statement released by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, Governor Fayose accused the APC and President Buhari of planning to rig the forthcoming Kogi and Bayelsa States governorship elections, using the newly appointed Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu and the Director General of Department of State Security (DSS), Alhaji Lawan Daura.

According to him, the suspension of the Appeal Court judgment on Senate President Bukola Saraki was “part of the grand plot to use a section of the judiciary to wrestle power from those the Buhari’s Presidency is not comfortable with.”

Fayose said the indefinite adjournment by the Appeal Court smacked of interference from the powers that be.

Governor Fayose warned that President Buhari and his party, are gradually eroding the fairness and transparency the Jonathan administration injected into Nigeria’s electoral system. He wondered why the governorship election in Yobe State was not nullified, despite evidence of electoral malpractices.

“There were widespread electoral malpractices during the presidential election in the North, with rampant under-aged voting. Yet, Dr Goodluck Jonathan and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) did not take steps capable of threatening Nigeria’s corporate existence.

“Curiously too, in a State like Yobe where it was established that the INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Abu Zarma received N15 million bribe from the Aide-de-Camp (ADC) to Governor Ibrahim Gaidam, Assistant Superintendent of Police, Zakari Deba to influence the State Governorship election, the tribunal did not nullify the election.”

The governor advised President Buhari to learn from the political crisis that resulted in the mid-60s and 1983, when attempts were made by the then Federal Government, to prevent the people of the South-West from having a government of their choice.

The Ekiti State Governor expressed the hope that the appellate court will protect the wish of the people of Rivers and Akwa-Ibom States and appealed to the people of the South-South not to be intimidated and discouraged.

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