- As candidate rejects result
- The people’ve spoken – Aregbesola
From Lawrence Olaoye and Ayodele Samuel, Osogbo
A dramatic turn of event has attended result of the Saturday’s governorship election in Osun state won by the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate and incumbent governor of the state, Rauf Aregbesola.
While President Goodluck Jonathan, the national leader of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the party headquarter in Abuja have both congratulated Aregbesola, describing the election as free and fair, the PDP candidate in the election, Iyiola Omisore has rejected the result and threatened to head to tribunal to challenge it.
The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Osun state yesterday said it would challenge the result of the Saturday’s Governorship election that produced Governor Rauf Aregbesola of APC in court.
The party in a statement issued by its Chairman, Alhaji Ganiyu Olaoluwa said the leadership of the party has resolved to reject the result of the election.
Olaoluwa said after a careful study of the results released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the party discovered that the result was doctored.
His words: “The PDP in Osun state will not accept the results of the gubernatorial election held in the state on Saturday owing to fraudulent activities discovered by the party.”
Olaoluwa said the election was marred with fraud, hence the resolve of the party to reject it totally.
“Osun PDP remains ever united and the Party as well as the legal team of the Party will meet on the way forward,” Olaoluwa said.
He also accused the APC of attacking PDP members in Osogbo, Olorunda, Isokan, Egbedore, Oriade, Ejigbo, Obokun, Ede North and Ede South Local Government Areas of the state.
However, despite the rejection of the results by Osun PDP, President Goodluck Jonathan and his ruling PDP, yesterday, described the results as free and fair, congratulating the Osun state governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, on his victory at the state governorship election held on Saturday
The President in a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati commended INEC and national security agencies for ensuring that the elections were free, fair, credible and peaceful in keeping with the avowed commitment of his Administration.
President Jonathan also applauded the people of Osun State who came out en- masse in all the local government areas of the state to peacefully and freely exercise their democratic right, trusting in his assurance that all necessary measures would be taken to ensure their safety and the sanctity of their votes.
According to the statement “The President believes that the free, fair and peaceful conduct of the elections have fully reaffirmed his administration’s determination to positively reform Nigeria’s electoral processes And also given the lie to the false, unfair and uncharitable allegations that measures put in place by the federal government for the Ekiti and Osun State elections were partisan and designed to achieve a favourable outcome for his party.”
Similarly, the leadership of the PDP, in a separate statement on Sunday, signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, also congratulated Aregbesola just as it commended its candidate, Senator Iyiola Omisore for his impressive outing which confirms that PDP commands massive followership in the state.
“After a careful appraisal of the overall conduct of the election, the national leadership of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), in spite of perceived anomalies, hereby accepts the results and congratulates Governor Rauf Aregbesola for his re-election.
“This is entirely in the interest of the growth of democracy, peace and political stability of the country in line with PDP’s ideology and the visions of our founding fathers” the PDP stated.
The PDP, however, called on Nigerians to continue to note that for the APC, elections are only free and fair when they win and rigged when they lose; adding that such is not acceptable in a democracy.
While urging the APC to learn from the election and desist from actions and utterances that overheat the system and create room for violence, called on its members and supporters to remain calm.
In his acceptance speech yesterday, governor Aregbesola promised not to let the people down. In the speech titled: Democratic Victory over Tyranny of power, Aregbesola said “I promise that we shall not rest on our oars but shall be spurred to work even harder with all well-meaning people of the State of Osun and the generality of Nigerians to continue to enjoy your trust and support.
He said the people of Osun have demonstrated in this election that in a democracy power truly belongs to the people, noting that the country remains in political bondage and “we must set her free,” he said.
The governor dismissed allegations against the APC saying that the PDP “obviously did all it could in a most desperate manner to steal the people’s mandate.
According to him, “A critical analysis of the elections shows a trend of general low voter turnout largely because of the atmosphere of deliberate tyranny and fear caused by the excessive militarization of the state.”
He said there was gross abuse of power and, of due process before, during, and even after the actual voting process was witnessed.
He said Osun state was unduly militarized in an unprecedented manner through criminal intimidation and psychological assault on the people. “This election witnessed an abuse of our security agencies and amounted to a corruption of their professional ethics and integrity.”
Aregbesola said, “Hundreds of leaders, supporters, sympathizers and agents of our party were arrested and detained. Also, hundreds of other innocent citizens including women and the aged were harassed, brutalized and traumatized.”
He also said the number of accredited voters in most local governments was less than half of registered voters.
Aregbesola declared that the election has sent a strong signal to all and sundry that no might is powerful enough to thwart the will of the people.
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