The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaigns Council (APC PCC) has urged the National Working Committee (NWC) to ensure the recovery of the party’s “stolen mandate” in the South East region during the just concluded general election.
The council accused the Labour Party (LP) of celebrating the ‘stolen mandate’ of APC in the region and called for a review of the results of the general elections in the region.
The PCC in conjunction with Coalition for Good Governance and Change Initiative, Center for Leadership Legacy International, and the United Arewa Movement for Peace and Good Governance, at a briefing in Abuja on Tuesday specifically asked the party’s NWC to step in and ensure that Hon. Nkeiruka Onyejeocha’s stolen mandate is recovered and restored.
Expressing concerns over the lukewarm attitude of the party to the purported victory of LP in the South East, the Secretary of the Directorate of Agro and Commodities of the PCC, Retson Tedheke, lamented that nobody in the party was speaking for candidates who were allegedly rigged out through votes suppression, intimidation of voters and obvious manipulation of elections results.
Lamenting, Tedheke said,:“Many frontline and dedicated members of the party, who contested for various elective positions but were denied victory arising from rigging by the opposition political parties, we are asking that the party stand strong for them, to ensure that they reclaim their stolen mandates without further delay, especially, in the prosecution of their cases before the Election Petition Tribunal.
“In the next few weeks, we will detail some of the shocking irregularities, abuses and fraud that we have uncovered with concrete evidence during the presidential and national assembly elections.
“Most outstanding case in view is that of House of Representatives Deputy Chief Whip, Hon Nkeiruka Onyejeocha, representing Isikwato/Umunneochi federal constituency. It’s on record that Hon Nkeiruka Onyejeocha was the only APC stalwart in Abia State, who openly identified with Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and stood on the podium to campaign along with him during the presidential across the region. While we don’t want to go into some of the issues she openly told Asiwaju during his campaign in the region, which eventually came to pass, we want to say that the party must stand up and reclaim all its stolen mandates in the country.
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“We like to put it on record that the Labour Party (LP) candidate for Isiukwato/Umunneochi federal constituency, Amaobi Ogah, was not a bonafide member of LP at the time of the party primary, because he left the APC and joined the PDP on March 19, 2022. On June 4, 2022, he joined LP and contested the party primaries four days later, on June 8. By contesting the primary on June 8, it explains clearly that he was not a member of any political party according to the provisions of the law and Electoral Act, 2022 (as amended).”
Tedheke described “the election of the Isiukwuato/ Umunneochi federal constituency as a sham and charade and if allowed to stand, would have thwarted the resolve of the majority of the people of the constituency and set a bad precedent for future elections.
“While this is not the only basis for which she is challenging the results of the Isiukwuato-Umunneochi Federal Constituency election of 25 February, we must also state it clear evidence of electoral infractions has been compiled to validate our claims.
“Our prayers therefore, are: the APC should and must make every move to reclaim its stolen mandates, even if it means setting up a committee from the existing Presidential Campaign Council to review what transpired during the elections.
“While Hon. Nkeiruka Onyejeocha has so far approached the Court to reclaim to challenge what members of her constituency have termed robbery hatched against her, we maintain that the Leadership of the APC at all levels rise to the occasion to retrieve her mandate and that of many others who contested on the platform but were robbed of their mandates through widespread malpractices, vote suppression and falsification of results as witnessed in the South-east.”
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