What a pity that a behemoth of crisis that the PDP
epitomizes, especially as it relates to electoral fraud
and outright failure to salvage the critical imbalances
in the political space that are capable of derailing and
truncating the nascent democracy never learnt to operate
away from self-induced affliction! Part of PDP’s
agonizing travails in Edo State has been that its
conquest propensity; the circumventing antics of
blurring the almost enduring democratic process, and the
criminal perpetuation of electoral vices has been
crushed in the Akoko-Edo re-run election, once and for
all.
The police men on guard at the INEC office, Igara who
outnumbered PDP thugs told of how their fully armed
militant thugs invaded the office and stayed all through
the night preceding the Election Day like giants
fire-flies. The PDP invading army stormed the INEC
office four consecutive times to orchestrate mayhem, but
were resisted; except in Ayegunle, the sleeping village
of Col. Tunde Akogun on the day of election. Their aim
was to cart away election materials in the PDP
tradition, so that election results are written and
announced before cock crows.
Senator Alhaji Yisa Braimoh himself acceded to this fact
in his earlier interview he granted THISDA Y newspaper
on August 28, 2009 that, ‘‘we mobilized, including
himself, our party supporters’’ – Braimoh was only short
of saying armed PDP hoodlums – ‘‘to head to INEC office
and stay guard there till morning’’. This is unbecoming
of a distinguished Senator and House of Representatives
members of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, who ought to
deliver good governance in the day time and have a
resounding sleep at night.
However, those who know Senator Yisa Braimoh and his
political antecedents might not be surprised about his
artful antics. The self-acclaimed Sariki Muslumi of
Afenmai land has built a reputation for employing
political thugs in every election. So far, he has gotten
away with the consequences of his actions. Senator
Braimoh, Col. Tunde Akogun and Hon. Johnson Abolagba,
the trio who fanned the ember of violence in the polling
unit in Col. Akogun’s house have been long in coming
into the torrid arena of ranked hypocrisy, with
incurably unbroken record of electoral violence to their
credit! It is only now, since 1999 that Col. Akogun has
been prevented from using the Nigeria army to rig
elections.
The Edo State Deputy Commissioner of Police, Mr. Olufemi
Adenaike who was in charge of the re-run election was
reported on page 9 of Vanguard Newspaper, August 24,
2009 as saying that following security reports that Col.
Tunde Akogun adopted electoral officials and materials
meant for the re-run election he moved swiftly to Col.
Akogun’s in Aiyegunle . I quote. ‘‘So I decided to head
to Akogun’s house where I had a meeting with him. And I
told him that I learnt that the INEC officials were held
hostage in his house, but he became angry and told me
not to insult him. ‘‘The SSS man with me also repeated
the same thing to him but he became really angry. So I
tried to persuade him on the need to free the INEC
officials so that voting can commence in the area.
‘‘He narrated his innocence, but as we were descending
downstairs, a woman pointed to me to come see where the
INEC officials and the electoral materials were hidden.
‘‘So I went there and free them and I took them to the
polling unit and told them to prepare everything for the
election to continue; but the woman was scared that if
we leave, the thugs will come back to beat them up, so
she pleaded we should stay while they conduct the
election. We decided to stay and asked people to queue
and cast their votes at about 3pm. That was how peace
returned to the area and election went on peacefully
without any hindrance’’.
No doubt, this clear and unambiguous statement by the
DCP captured the entire scenario of his team who managed
to navigate the numerous pot holes on the federal road
to Col. Akogun’s house who could not repair them, or use
his acclaimed Federal might and connection to repair
them for over six years in the House, and as the leader
of the House of Representative. That may not be the only
‘shameful’ encounter DCP and INEC had with these
shameless election riggers.
Understandably, this would fall into the deaf ears of
PDP drowning leaders in Edo State and their collaborator
in Abuja who are Hell bent on associating AC stalwarts;
Chief Austine Amune and Bayo Adams with the mayhem PDP
bunch of wags intend to visit on the Akoko-Edo
constituency 1 people while the election lasted. The
thugs, charms, arms and ammunition the Inspector General
of Police displayed in Abuja was a PDP desperate and
concocted falsehood, and a grand design to pass off
their militant thugs over as AC’s.
This time round, the people have said enough of their
electoral brigandage. The fairness of this rerun
election takes the people back, for instance to April 14
2007, when the most blatant election manipulation took
place at the hands of the yet-to-be fully purged Maurice
Iwu’s INEC. What the people of Akoko-Edo have said to
their aggressors – Braimoh, Akogun and Abolagba and
their ink is this: you have taken our home, you have
taken our wealth, you have taken our livelihood, you
have taken away our sense of security and you have even
taken our volition, but you can not continue to steal
our vote at all times.
If anything, the triumph of will over might in Akoko-Edo
shows that the seemingly futile attempts to smoother the
expression of populous democracy; the bye-product of
representative governance has yielded bountiful harvest.
Now, PDP and its minders are seeking a way out of the
unsavory dilemma into which their nearly 12 years of the
locust at the helm of affairs in Edo State has thrust
the party – fixated failure and ineptitude over and
above the claims of total control of the state machinery
of power. Now, the thwarted custodians of total control
of Edo State politics, who have boasted of their
abilities to swallow, intact, the civic rights of the
people to vote, and dare the people to go and have jump
in the high sea; even salted and spiced by the public
fund can now rethink their mischievous connivance in the
subsequent elections.
They may continue to opt for the elusive contest of who
serves the godfather better for all they care, but the
resounding victory AC recorded in the rerun election
reiterated the foremost democratic dividend of having a
say in the governing process of one’s own state and
country. I advice the PDP to continue to pursue
illusions since it is their lots to do so. It is when
attempts are made – just the way they did in Akoko-Edo
constituency 1, re-run election – to stuff and flaunt
such illusion in the faces of the people to intimidate
that the crushing might of the peoples’ will resonate in
the courage of their convention to stand up and be
counted.
The peoples’ determination to concern electoral
maleficent into the dustbin of history was explicit and
remarkable in their renewed desire that saw to the
triumph of will over might! The embattled PDP chapter in
Edo State on multiple fronts raced to the media; along
with their mafia interest groups in Abuja , after their
never-do-well candidate, Anslem Agbabi lost a keenly
contested election to a better focus political party, AC
and a more resourceful candidate, Kabiru Adjoto. The
fairness of the election is reflective in the sum total
of votes each candidate scored. While AC candidate
scored 5, 345 votes, the PDP candidate garnered 3, 637
votes.
The PDP master riggers who have characteristically
authored the act of stonewalling, ballot snatching and
stuffing and the booming gun to a grand art are now
troubled with the conduct of the freest and fairest
election the people of Akoko-Edo constituency 1 has
seen, since the beginning of the 4th republic. The
peoples’ redemption son in Akoko-Edo for having their
vote count after many years of frustration and in the
dungeon of PDP’s bondage did not go down well with the
political tyrants.
While Adams Oshiomhole was battle crying all through his
union career and activism for the sanctity of electoral
democracy that accommodates one-man-one-vote, which the
PDP detests to the nation’s chagrin and detriment and
unto its eternal shame – apologies to their ‘Patriarch
of Modern Nigeria’, ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo – the
author, concoctor , cultivator, and the executor of
do-or-die election in Nigeria.
Action Congress, AC should be credited for conducting a
generally accepted election. The Edo State Chapter of
Nigeria Union of Journalist and Civil Society Coalition;
which monitored the rerun election at Akoko-Edo
constituency 1, congratulated INEC and the Nigeria
Police Force for leaving up to expectation in the face
of daunting challenges. In a statement wildly published
in no less than six national daily, the group
congratulated INEC, the Nigeria Police Force, State
Security Services and encourage them to improve on their
output in the subsequent elections.
The state INEC Resident Electoral Comissioner, REC
Aniedi Abasi Ikoiwak who in his official capacity has
the last word on the rerun election satisfies the poll
as 90% free and fair. Those who are still in doubts
whether or not the Akoko-Edo re-run election suffered
hick-ups might do themselves a word of good to cross
check their facts with the one provided by the REC
Commissioner. The election was also hailed by INEC
Chairman, Prof. Maurice Iwu and other NGOs as the most
peaceful in the annals of elections in the state and the
local government in particular.
The most baffling of it all is the hiring of one Mr.
Solomon Osahuohien by PDP to lay the seeds of
distractions – new ways to pursue a tenacious agenda to
rule Edo State ; among other states, for the next 60
years, or forever. Osahuohien’s publication in the
Vanguard Newspaper of August 31 and September 1, 2009,
on page 19 respectively, put together formed a crooked
line. He came across as an errant scion of slave drivers
who harbours atrocious misgivings against a free people
to elect their own representative and, as the bearer of
PDP’s saga of acquisitive obsession for power that flows
from the barrels of do-or-die elections.
The baleful outing of the evasive Solomon Osahuohien to
lure attention away from the PDP oppressive legacy and
social assaults on the civilized race to render them
politically mute in the face of odious tyranny is most
insulting. Solomon’s pain arises from the fact that PDP
schemes to keep the people down in the ditch has become
as elusive as their ambition to rule the state for ever
run.
You can not but pity a political party and its bellicose
drowning jobbers who are trying to cling to every
available straw to stay afloat.
Erasmus Ikhide is the Senior
Special Assistant, Media Affairs
To Edo State Governor, Comrade
Adams Aliyu Oshiomhole.
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