Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, yesterday accused the opposition All Progressives Congress, APC, of plans to impersonate technical staff of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, so as to tamper with the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System, BVAS, to rig the Edo State governorship election.
Addressing a press conference at the party’s State Secretariat, Chairman of the party, Anthony Aziegbemi also accused the opposition party of uploading foreigners and emojis as party agents, while Labour Party, LP, was accused of uploading one picture several times and
warned the Independent National Electoral Commission not to allow any political party that has not filled its party agents after the July 30 expiration date to do so.
But reacting to PDP’s allegation, the Media Director of APC Campaign Council, Prince Kassim Afegbua, said it is the PDP that is planning to rig the poll.
He called on the party to campaign to the electorate, saying the N500 million that the state government allegedly spent on hiring Rema to Benin, should have been spent to improve the lot market women who he said are suffering.
On the claim of political parties not meeting INEC’s deadline for the submission of party agents, Afegbua said the agent’s names had been submitted, explaining that all parties had up till midnight yesterday to upload the agents’ pictures to INEC.
Aziegbemi said at the press conference that APC did not meet the requirement in uploading party agents in 3,037 polling units and in 17 local governments, which means the party has polling agents in only 1,482 polling units, while the ruling PDP uploaded polling agents in 4,378 polling units and failed to upload in just 141 polling units.
He urged Edo people not to trust the APC with their votes.
He said ”On August 29, INEC invited national chairmen and secretaries (of political parties) for an emergency meeting in Abuja.
“To our amazement, the APC did not meet with the requirement in 3,037 polling units and in 17 local government, which means the APC has polling agents in only 1,482 polling units and one local government agent. PDP uploaded polling agents in 4,378 polling units, but could not meet the requirements in 141 polling units. A party that cannot upload its polling unit agents in two-thirds of the polling units cannot be trusted with power in our state. We demand that no political party be allowed to correct this anomaly.”
Continuing, he said “Secondly, we wish to draw the attention of INEC and Edolites to the sinister plan of the APC which has been uncovered by our intelligence unit. APC has perfected plans to use fake INEC staff posing as technical staff to temper with the BVAS Machine on the day of election to beef up the number of accredited voters on the BVAS machine.”
