Govs in Collusion with Persons at INEC, Security Agencies Plotting to Reverse Electronic Voting, CSO Alleges

Emameh Gabriel in Abuja

A civil society organisation, Partners for Electoral Reform, yesterday raised the alarm over an alleged plot by some desperate politicians working in collusion with security agencies and some staff of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to rig the 2023 general elections through manual voting.

This was just as it also alleged that there were ongoing efforts to remove the INEC Chairman, Prof. Mamood Yakubu.

Chairman of the group, Mr. Ezenwa Nwagwu, who is also a member of the board of YIAGA, another civil society organisation in the country, made the allegations in an interview with journalists in Abuja.

He said Yakubu was being threatened by known persons  in the country.

“I think that the current INEC leadership has for me put in place a legacy that you can’t erase in the sense that it has successfully restored power back to the people. Power to elect has returned back to the polling units.

“But that has triggered a lot of reaction from politicians who are completely absent in any conversation about reforms. What that means is that there seems to be a spotlights on electronic transmission of results.

“There seems to be a lot of interests around the BVAS and these are the game changers for 2023.Politicians in collusion with even some elements within INEC and the security agents,” he alleged were part of the grand conspiracy against the nation.

Ezenwa who called for an investigation on the allegations recently raised by CUPP, said there was need for citizens to rise against any plot aimed at taking back the power to elect their representatives at level through advanced technology.

According to him: “For me is the big challenge for 2023. The threats of reversal of all the gains, incremental gains that we have made to restore power back to the citizens of the country, through the polling units.

“Few days ago, the CUPP addressed a press conference, and the reaction to that was of interest to me. It doesn’t look as if a lot of people are taking that press conference seriously.

“The allegations that were made deserve investigation. If you can have a congress or coalition of political parties coming to say that the 2023 election is threatened and that there are people who are working to even remove the INEC chairman, and citizens are just like okay, ‘its one of those press conferences

“What is the issue? If power has been restored back to the citizens of this country in a way that they can determine their leaders? I think that the media and civil society must continue to amplify those threats. And if possible, beam bigger search lights in ensuring that the people that have been pinpointed do not lay roles that can truly make that bad dream come true.”

He added: “Firstly, you have seen the way the residents electoral commissioners were appointed? We did address the press, calling the attention to the fact that a lot of people with tainted pasts –  about five people – with tainted past have been cleared by the National Assembly. And the National Assembly is putting up very lame excuses that there were no affidavits and that nobody swore to affidavits.

“But you saw somebody who contested election in 2014 to be governor of a state, in a particular political party. That man is sitting pretty today as an INEC Commissioner. And we said there is nothing wrong with it.

“So if he was a party member five years ago, it is not enough to get him out of that place? he asked.

He, however called on President Muhammadu Buhari to hold up to his promises of leaving a legacy of electoral integrity.

“So we calling on the President to rein in the security agencies. To align them with his vision of a legacy of electoral integrity. He, himself being a beneficiary of that,” he appealed.