By Onyekachi Eze
In view of what transpired last weekend in Ngor Okpala, and the attendant mixed reactions trailing the conduct of the election, more condemnations have followed the manner INEC handled the polls.
Based on certain allegations leveled against APC and the State Governor, a group known as Orlu Political Action Committee, OPAC, has requested the President, Muhammadu Buhari to call Uzodinma to order.
In a statement signed by the Publicity Secretary, Barr. Nnamdi Maduka, it stated that President Buhari must intervene to save democracy.
According to the release, they accused the Governor of mandating his appointees and loyalists with armed men on Ngor Okpala to perpetrate electoral fraud.
The press release reads;
“A state constituency by-election that was supposed to be seamless, peaceful, credible, transparent and hitch-free was then reduced to total warfare. Ballot boxes were wantonly snatched away by APC chieftains aided by truckloads of security operatives and militiamen, ad hoc officials of INEC were massively kidnapped and results written at private residences of Uzodinma’s agents and in hotel rooms too. This is an anomie of indescribable proportion.
“We are therefore deeply troubled by the orgy of violence and electoral fraud in Ngor Okpala, and we firmly believe that if that travesty is allowed to stand, the far-reaching implications will be costly and unhealthy for democracy in Nigeria at large.
“As an immediate step to remedy the situation, we demand that INEC should outrightly cancel the NgorOkpala bye-election within forty-eight hours. Failure to do this will be an invitation to mass outage and overwhelming action by the people of Imo state.
“We call on the Inspector General of Police to immediately arrest and prosecute all the agents, cronies, allies and henchmen of Uzodinma and chieftains of the APC who were caught in the very shameful abductions, shootings, mayhem and electoral fraud that marred the Ngor Okpala bye-election.
“President Mohammadu Buhari should also call Hope Uzodinma to order. The impression Imo people get is that all the atrocities of Hope Uzodinma in Imo State go unpunished because of the cover which he gets from Aso Rock. The President owes Imo people a duty to stop Uzodinma from destroying democracy in the state. President Buhari must therefore demonstrate that he never endorsed the unacceptable electoral fraud which Uzodinma and his agents carried out in Ngor Okpala”.
