And The Campaign of Blackmail and Calumny Against INEC Continues

INEC–  Following the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal judgement of 6th September 2023 which affirmed that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu (GCFR) was duly and validly elected in a ruling that was detailed, diligent, logical,  intellectual and based on the provisions of the law as stipulated, after dissecting all the points raised by the petitioners and counter arguments of the respondents, the losers and their supporters have now changed gear again in their campaign of blackmail and calumny to INEC.

Immediately after the conduct of the successful and credible 2023 presidential elections and before the declaration of the results and the winner by the electoral umpire, the two major losing candidates having seen the handwriting on the wall, jointly addressed a world press conference where they both called for the cancellation of the election on the grounds that the election was characterized by fraud and malpractice.

But surprisingly, in a 360% turn around, both the 2nd and 3rd placed losers candidates again changed the music as they went their different ways, but this time, both the 2nd and 3rd placed losers claimed differently that they won the election and called on INEC to declare each of them separately as the winner.

This new twists to the claims of the 2nd and 3rd placed losers can best be described as the theatre of the absurd because if you both claim that an election was rigged and should be cancelled, how can you in the same breadth turnaround and claim victory in the same election that you both claimed was flawed? How dishonourable and criminal can one be in trying to claim ownership of the proceeds of a flawed process?

Having failed in their shenanigans, both losing parties and candidates approached the presidential election petition tribunal which is statutorily established by law to adjudicate on grievances arising from the election, petitioning their complaints which was the right thing to do instead of their naked dance of shame.

As expected, the labour party and it’s candidate continued to cry all over the public space that their mandate was stolen at the presidential election and that they were going to retrieve it at the presidential election petition tribunal based on a new found ground of the winner not scoring 25% in Abuja which is mandatory according to their own law and not the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

To actualize their plots in tandem with their campaign methods of abuse, curse, bully, intimidate and threaten violence on political opponents and supporters, the labour party and it’s supporters changed the object of their campaign of blackmail and calumny from INEC to the judiciary like never witnessed before our political history.

After listening to all the parties in the presidential election petition tribunal proceedings, the parties were directed to file and adopt their final written addresses, consequent upon which counsels were told that they would be notified of judgement day.

Thus 6th September 2023 was scheduled as judgement day. On the judgement day, Nigerians and the rest of the world watched for over 13 hours how the honourable Justices of the Presidential election petition tribunal painstakingly dissected the issues and ruled on points of law that all the petitioners grounds for petitioning the tribunal over the conduct of the 2023 presidential election was vague, unspecific, nebulous, generic and lack merit.

The tribunal even highlighted the fraud of the petitioners in subpoening “experts” who were exposed during cross examination as card carrying members of the petitioners party and were intended to mislead the panel. In the landmark courageous, thorough and law based ruling, the judges dismissed 10 out of the 13 witnesses testimonies of the labour party, the peoples democratic party witnesses also suffered similar fate for being biased, unworthy and unreliable witnesses.

A known and shameful exposure of the fraudulent claims of the petitioners especially the labour party by the tribunal was that, the labour party in challenging the victory of the duly and validly declared winner, claimed to have deployed 133, 000 party polling agents to polling stations nationwide on election day,  but in order to be clever by half, it deliberately refused to produce not even one of it’s party polling agent or a polling station result sheet form EC8A to buttress it’s allegations because it knew that doing so, will damage it’s case beyond repair.

Sadly, the losing parties, candidates and their supporters have now changed gear again even when they have rejected the PEPT judgement and stated that they were going to the supreme court for redress, by making INEC the scapegoat for their misadventures at the polls and in the PEPT.

They are now on a fresh round of campaign of blackmail and calumny against INEC, that it was it’s failure to transmit the results electronically that resulted in their electoral loss at the polls and the tribunal even when the judgement of the court vindicated INEC of complying substantially with the provisions of the law. Yet this was the same LP and PDP that refused or failed to produce just one results sheet form EC8A of just one polling station from its 133, 000 party agents deployed to polling stations nationwide on election day to buttress it’s lies, falsehood and misinformation of electoral manipulation against INEC.

As they continue in this rigmarole of campaign of blackmail and calumny against INEC for their electoral and judicial waterloo, let it be stated emphatically that every anti democratic elements trying to imperil our democracy by whatever means, are on an exercise in futility.

God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Thank you.

Yours Sincerely,

Nelson Ekujumi,