LP presidential candidate Peter Obi, Have Accused INEC Of Manipulated Election Results

 

The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, has accused the Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) of compromising its neutrality as election umpire by manipulating the results of the February 25 presidential polls in favour of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and its candidate, Bola Tinubu.

Obi, who was responding to INEC’s preliminary objections and reply to his petition, said it was wishful thinking by the Commission to submit that his petition and reliefs sought therein before the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal (PEPT), are vague, imprecise and ungrantable.

The candidate urged the tribunal to assume jurisdiction and proceed to determine his petition as it was brought before it with necessary parties as required by law.

Obi, who picked holes in INEC’s contention that it relied on manual documents in declaring the winner of the disputed election, argued that by the applicable laws and regulations, the legitimate mode for resolving disputes at the collation is by resorting to the result uploaded on the IReV using the BVAS.

He submitted that as of the date of filling this reply on April 21, “the information on INEC’s IReV portal shows that out of the 176,846 polling units, the result submitted were in respect of 167,433 polling units; and that the percentage of the uploaded result on the IReV is 94.68 per cent.

He stated that the results of the election were manipulated and not properly computed using the actual scores of the candidates nor verified with the release of the uploaded results on the IReV.

He also stated that failure to upload the presidential election results using BVAS to the IReV as required by law was a ploy by INEC to manipulate the actual results of the election.

Obi, who accused INEC of abandoning its role of neutrality during the election, said the global best practice for electoral umpires in national elections is that an electoral body must avoid creating an impression that it has no respect for neutrality in an electoral contest between candidates.

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