Youths in Plateau have come out to protest, following the failure of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to declare the winner for the Plateau Central Senatorial election eight days after the election was concluded.
The protest had Youths who were loyal to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP comes out in their numbers in the early hours of Saturday 4th March at the INEC State office in Jos.
The youths were holding various placards with different inscriptions calling for the immediate release of the result which they believe is in favor of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Senatorial candidate, Hon. Golkuna Gotum.
Addressing the protesting Youths, Comr. Naankin Mathew Dafoum speaking, on behalf of the National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN) and Comr. Nanswa Sargwak, the Chairman, of the Joint Campus Council of the National Association of Nigerian Students, said the youths gathered to express their dissatisfaction with the delay on the announcement of the result of the Plateau Central Senatorial election by INEC.
“We call on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to declare Hon. Golkuna Gotum as the winner for the Plateau Central Senatorial election as it is obvious that he won the election of the 25th February with landslide victory and have the indicators and our situation room report” They said
He complained that days after the polls, INEC failed to upload election results from Kanam Local Government into its server and called for cancellation of results in areas where there was over voting.
“INEC has the capacity to discharge justice, equity and fairness to Nigerians and in Plateau Central Senatorial District where elections were held on the 25 of February, 2023, I wonder the kind of election that will take 7 days for result to be declare.”
He explained that INEC has announced the result for Plateau North and South Senatorial Districts and wonder why that of Plateau Central is delayed seven days after the conclusion of the election, saying he is demanding for justice, equity and fairness from INEC.
Gotum dismissed the rumour peddling round that the election was declared inconclusive and expressed dissatisfaction in the role of the INEC Returning Officer who failed to declare him winner of the poll.
“We have petitioned INEC based on the section 64 subsection 7 of the 2022 Electoral Act which stipulated that when the disputed result in contentions are found not to be correct, the collation officer shall re-collate the results and announced it based on the information provided in the electoral Act.
“We have three basic issues, mutilation of results, casting of illegal figure and when the collation officer was asked to take the figure out at the collation centre in Pankshin, he refused and the third issue was that there are about 9 federal ward in Kanam that election did not hold.
“The simple evidence is what is obtainable in the INEC portal, since from the 25 of February that the election was conducted up till Thursday 1 March, 2023, there is no result on the INEC portal until this morning Friday 2 March that a face of a lady was seen posting result on the INEC portal.”
He called on the Resident Electoral Commissioner Plateau State, Dr. Oliver Agundu to act in a sincere manner and order the Returning Officer to do the right thing by announcing him the winner of the election.
