Bayelsa Poll: How Tribunal Exposed Sylva, Police Commissioner’s Fraud, Diri Explains

Olusegun Samuel in Yenagoa

Bayelsa State Governor, Senator Douye Diri, has said the state’s governorship election petition tribunal, which sat in Abuja, exposed the electoral fraud perpetrated by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the November 11, 2023 poll in the state, Chief Timipre Sylva, the party’s chairman and a former Commissioner of Police.

The tribunal had Monday dismissed the APC and Sylva’s petition challenging the declaration of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of Diri of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as winner of the election for lacking in merit.

Diri spoke Tuesday night at the King  of Glory Chapel in Government House, Yenagoa, where he stopped for thanksgiving upon his arrival from Abuja.

A crowd of jubilant party members and supporters thronged the state airport and the Government House to welcome the governor. 

A statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Daniel Alabrah, quoted the governor as saying that during cross-examination at the tribunal, the APC witnesses shot themselves in the foot with frivolous claims and inconsistent exhibits.

He narrated how a former Commissioner of Police in the state, Mr. Tolani Alausa, who was procured as a star witness in the case, tainted his image by tendering false evidence before the court and was humiliated for parading fake INEC documents.

He said although Mr Alausa was no longer the CP in the state, the senior police officer presented himself at the tribunal to defend the fraud perpetrated by the APC candidate.

Diri also said the tribunal equally excoriated the party’s chairman in the state, Chief Dennis Otiotio, for his “unprofessional conduct” being a legal practitioner.

He called on the judiciary to place heavy sanctions on frivolous matters and abuse of court processes by those desperate to subvert the wishes of the people.

Diri, however, described the litigation process by Sylva as a deceptive plot by those who attempted to steal in broad daylight and still crying wolf about a miscarriage of justice by the tribunal.