Diasporans For PDP Calls For Resignation Of INEC Leadership, Warns Buhari Not To Rig Guber, Assembly Elections

As Nigeria prepares for governorship and House of Assembly elections on Saturday, March 18, 2023, the US-based not-for-profit organization, Diasporans for PDP, composed of Nigerians living in the diaspora, has called for the resignation of the leadership of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), as they warned President Buhari to desist from any attempt to rig the election.

“We call on the Nigerian government to bring in capable and competent persons to manage the gubernatorial and House of Assembly elections. We ask them to desist from corruption, vote rigging and vote buying, which they shamelessly displayed to the whole world in the just concluded presidential election of February 25, 2023,” emphasized the organization’s founder and national chair Honourable Mrs. Victoria Pamugo.

“Everything is wrong with the process. President Buhari and his good friend, Mahmood Yakubu, are ganging up again to deceive Nigerians through another pretentious display of an odious level of incompetence,” Hon. Pamugo lamented.

Recall that on February 25, 2023, Nigerians from East to West, North to South came out and voted massively in the presidential election. A few days later, under the guise of a public display of incompetence, under the cover of night, Mahmood Yakubu and his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), squeezed life out of democracy in Nigeria.

Prior to the election, both Buhari and Yakubu promised Nigerians a free and fair election. In a November 16, 2022 INEC press statement, Yakubu wrote as follows:

“As I have said repeatedly, the Commission’s allegiance is to Nigeria. Our loyalty is to Nigerians who want free, fair, credible and verifiable elections supported by technology, which guarantees transparent accreditation and upload of polling unit results for citizens to view real-time on Election Day.”

They promised Nigerians that the February 25 election was going to be the most transparent not only in Nigerian history, but also in the history of Africa. They promised that election results were going to be transmitted directly through the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV). They promised that there was “no going back” on the use of BVAS because the technology “guaranteed transparent accreditation and upload of polling unit results for citizens to view real-time on Election Day”.

After all those promises, INEC and APC failed Nigerians and the world. They violated every single aspect of the electoral law and INEC guidelines. Why? Because they already had a plan to rig the election in favour of their corrupt political party and friends. They rushed to impose their tired APC friend on the Nigerian people as President-Elect even when it was obvious that he had not met the constitutional threshold to become President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

INEC told Nigerians that they had issued 87.2 million Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs), out of 93 million registered voters. They declared their friend President-Elect with only 8.8 million votes, which is only 10% of the 87.2 million Nigerians with a PVC. The hasty announcement of the APC candidate as President-Elect was at odds with Nigeria’s electoral law and INEC guidelines.

Now, INEC is avoiding every responsibility to prove to Nigerians and the whole world that the results of the February 25 presidential election it announced were real. Nigerians as well as the international community have been calling on INEC to provide evidence that the numbers they published as presidential election results were not fabricated. Instead of providing the evidence, INEC is doing everything to avoid responsibility.

“Now, where is that loyalty that Yakubu talked about? Are Nigerians’ mistrust of INEC and its leadership not justified? Have Buhari, Yakubu and INEC done anything since that shambolic election to reassure Nigerians that the upcoming election will be different? Should Yakubu and his friends not have resigned for having destroyed Nigerians’ trust on the institution and allow competent people to come in and run the upcoming election? How can we trust them ever again with our elections and democracy? How can they assure Nigerians that this governorship and House of Assembly election will not be another shamble?” she asked.

“The March 18th election offers an opportunity for INEC to attempt to repair its damaged reputation, if the chairman has any shame left. An attempt to rig the governorship and House of Assembly elections after what they did in February will be unacceptable to all Nigerians as well as the international community,” Hon. Pamugo said.

“As Nigerians in diaspora, we challenge INEC to redeem its battered image if they had any shame left. The current incompetent leadership must resign and competent people need to be brought in to run the election, even if it means postponing the election. They have a responsibility to restore their integrity, trust in the institution, and ensure the rights of all Nigerians to choose their own leaders through their own votes. It would be a great mistake for INEC to attempt again to impose governors on the people in the March 18 election. Nigerians do not deserve another flawed election, a shamble, and the total disgrace, which took place on February 25.”

Diasporans for PDP is a registered non-profit organization based in the United States of America, with members from many countries including but not limited to Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom and United States of America.