SDP demands cancellation of Ondo LG polls, removal of ODIEC chair

The Social Democratic Party (SDP), in Ondo State, has called for the cancellation of the Saturday’s Local Government election in the State, describing it as a “show of shame”, concocted by the ruling All Progressives Congress-led Government under Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa.

Recall that the State Independent Electoral Commission (ODIEC) declared the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the Saturday’s polls in all 18 Local Government Areas of the State, defeating other political parties.

But, repsonding on the political scenario, Ebenezer Akinbuli, the SDP Chairman, while speaking with journalists on Monday in Akure, Ondo State capital, denounced the Council polls, alleging widespread irregularities, harassment and intimidation of the SDP party’s agents.

Akinbuli said; “Want to condemn the “selection 2.0 (Governorship poll was described as 1.0).that took place in Ondo State on Saturday, there was no election in the State as far as we are concerned because what happened was a pure of show of shame, and that is why we are calling for the immediate cancellation of the poll.

“Also, we are calling for the removal or honourable resignation of the State Chairman, ODIEC, Joseph Aremo, he deserves not to be among the honourables. We’ve engaged him, and he assured us as a political party that he was going to be a fair umpire. But it’s unfortunately that he didn’t do as he has promised.

“We call for the cancellation of the poll because all the poling units across the 18 local government were floored with manners of irregularities and Electoral Officers were not given the sheets to write the results of the election and they were announcing APC candidates winners when they did not even told us the results.

“We condemn the election based on; “no strict adherence to the rules guilding the election by ODIEC, they did not provide forms for the Electoral Officers, they just gave them the plain sheet of papers to write the results of the election at the Collation Centres and it’s a pure breach of the rules that guided the election in the state.

Read also: We’re not participating in Saturday’s Ondo LG poll — PDP

“No adequate security for the exercise, APC agents were seen threatening others political parties agents, that they should allow them to thumb printing and that was how they did across the entire 18 local government areas of the state which led to the low turnout of voters recorded on Saturday.

“APC thugs were the one that took over the election, they were the one thumb printing and there was no security in 95 per cent of the poling units across the council areas.

“They already had the ballot papers thumb-printed in their favour before the exercise, which we described as a broad day light robbery of our electoral process and we are not going to accept that. In view of all these reasons, we call for the cancellation of the poll.

“We are issuing the state government a warning to do the needful, Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa should not do as how he manipulated the governorship election and that is why we are begging the good people of Ondo State to join the SDP in this struggle to redeem the state.

“We need to be freed, we say no to political slavery in Ondo State, we say no to one political party system. For instance, during the election, in Odigbo local government area, Hon. Iroju Ogundeji, the former Deputy Speaker of the State House of Assembly, became the ODIEC staff. They were seen manipulating the ballot papers in favour of the APC.

“He, (Ogundeji) even arrested one of our members and took him to the Ore police station with his vehicle for filming their irregularities.

“The just concluded local government election was a total fraud, the counsellorship and chairmanship candidates were mandated to pay tax heavily to the account of the state government for this election not knowing that they will use the money to defraud us.

“We are going to file a petition personally against the ODIEC chairman, Joseph Aremo for his involvement in this election and we are also going to challenge the outcome of the election.”