As reactions and counter reactions still trail last Saturday’s gubernatorial election in Osun State, a human rights activist, Comrade Adeniyi Alimi Sulaiman has totally rejected the stance of the authority of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) by pronouncing the concluded guber poll as inconclusive.
He described the position of the electoral umpire as a threat to Nigeria’s hard earned democracy and 2019 general elections.
He urged the authority of the electoral Commission to respect the wishes of the electorates who voted massively for the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the Saturday guber election by declaring Senator Ademola Adeleke as winner of the election, arguing that the electoral guidelines which INEC rested upon to declare the concluded guber election as inconclusive is null, void and ultra vires in the face of Supreme Court of Nigeria, Section 69 of the amended Electoral Act,2010 and Section 179 of the amended 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
He also thrown his weight behind the allegation of bias and favouritism leveled against the Nation’s electoral Commission by the Coalition of United Political Parties(CUPP) for releasing the uncollected Permanent Voters Card(PVC) to the members of the ruling All Progressives Congress(APC) in the units where the rerun election slated to be held on Thursday.
Comrade Sulaiman who alleged that his sister group, the Civil Societies Coalition for the Emancipation of Osun State (CSCEOS) had earlier raised an alarm before the conduct of the concluded Saturday gubernatorial election that the electoral umpire was planning to release the uncollected PVC to the ruling party (APC) so as to have edged ahead of other contenders in the guber election.
In another development, Sulaiman who is the Executive Chairman, Centre for Human Rights and Social Justice (CHRSJ), strongly condemned the illegal arrest of the opposition political leader,Alhaji Fatai Oyedele Diekola by the Police in a case which he was a complainant and brigandage against the members of the opposition political parties in the State, calling for immediate release of Alhaji Diekola or his group takes the option of legal means to secure the release of Alhaji Diekola.
According to him, “I appreciated the conduct of the Osun electorates through the period of the concluded Saturday guber election. The conduct of osun poll was similar to the conduct of the annul June 12, 1993 Presidential election which Bashorun M.K.O. Abiola was the winner.The Monday attack on Alhaji Fatai Diekola is evil, barbaric, ungodly and crime against humanity.
“It has shown that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and INEC are conniving together to subvert the desires of the Osun electorates as regard the conduct of the last Saturday governorship election in the State. All the illegalities being trying to perpetrate by the INEC in connivance with the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) would not stand the test of the time over Thursday rerun election. The actions of APC and INEC show serious threat to our current democratic experience which all lovers’ democracy should stand against.
Sulaiman further advised that the ruling APC should stop the onslaught against the members of the opposition political parties in the State over the illegal forthcoming rerun election in seven(7) units of the four(4) local government areas of the State, advising the ruling APC to accept their electoral defeat in good faith.
He therefore called on the genuine lovers and defenders of democracy to rise up by defending the current rape of democracy in Osun State, urging President Muhammadu Buhari as a man of integrity being called himself to prevail on the authority of the Independent national Electoral Commission (INEC) to declare the winner of the Osun guber poll without further delaying in accordance with the stipulated law of the land.
Packaged by Rahman Salami
