No fewer than twelve political parties in Osun State, including the major opposition Peoples Democratic Party, have accused the ruling All Progressives Congress of putting pressure on the Independent National Electoral Commission to shift the Osun West bye-election scheduled for July 8.
Addressing journalists in Ede on Sunday, the party chairmen joined by two stalwarts of APC said to have dumped the ruling party, warned INEC against postponing the bye-election, saying, “Moral burden is on INEC not to shift the Osun West bye-election.”
The other parties are the All Progressives Grand Alliance, Action Alliance, Democratic Peoples Party, Peoples Democratic Movement, Social Democratic Party, Green Party of Nigeria, and Alliance for Democracy.
The remaining parties are Unity Party of Nigeria and Peoples Party of Nigeria.
Speaking on behalf of the parties under the umbrella of the Conference of Nigerian Political Parties, the chairman of DPP, Prince Gbade Adelakun, who doubles as the secretary of CNPP claimed there were strong indications that INEC was being pressurised to move the election date forward.
Adelakun, flanked by other party chairmen, also accused the APC of using public school pupils in the state for data capturing ahead of the bye-election, adding that the ruling party had concluded plans to connive with some thugs in the state to rig the election.
The parties, however, asked security agencies to checkmate possible rigging of the election through the use of some political thugs they referred to as “State Boys.”
Adelakun said that the APC was jittery of the imminent loss they would suffer at the poll, saying this was the reason why the party was allegedly making efforts to persuade INEC to shift the election date.
Consequently, the parties said they would petition the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, about the alleged moves by the APC to manipulate the poll.
He said, “We oppose plans by the INEC to shift the date of the Osun West bye-election. Moral burden is on INEC not to shift the election date. We had met with the leadership of INEC and we told them that the election should hold on July 22, but the INEC changed it to July 8 and we agreed. But, information at our disposal revealed that the APC is putting pressures on INEC to shift the election date forward.
“We have it on good authority that pupils from the state public schools in the state are being used by APC for data capturing and thumb printing. What for? Why? They are also conniving with “State Boys”, notorious gang group to rig election. We, therefore, call on security agencies to prevent rigging.”
The two APC stalwarts, Alhaji Bayo Aminu, from Ede South Local Government and Alhaji Lukman Afolabi, former secretary of Ede South Local Government, who attended the briefing, said they were in support of the call on the electoral body not to shift the election date, maintaining that their former party (APC) was interested in shifting the bye-election.
The political parties, however, revealed that they had instructed their members to cast their votes for the candidate of PDP, Otunba Ademola Adeleke, in the poll.
But the APC Director of Publicity, Mr. Kunle Oyatomi, denied these allegations describing them as baseless.
The head of the INEC team in the state, Mr. Emmanuel Ademushire, did not pick calls made to his phone by our correspondent. He did not also reply the text sent to his phone.
