Edo ACN, PDP feud over alleged fresh rigging plots

ACN_08-01-10Group faults gov on road project

THE Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and the Peoples Democratic Party in Edo State are still on the warpath over alleged fresh plots by the two parties to rig the July 14, 2012 governorship polls.

While the ACN accuses the PDP of sewing uniforms for fake National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members it planned to use to rig the election, the opposition party claimed that the ACN in concert with a consultant to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had procured observer identification cards for its thugs to invade voting centres and facilitate its rigging plot.

Amid this verbal war, the Edo Youth Vanguard (EYV) has said the Minister of State for Works, Ambassador Bashir Yuguda’s visit to the abandoned Ada-Okere-Ukoni-Amedokhian Road ahead of its rehabilitation, had shown that Governor Adams Oshiomhole was incorrect on his claims that it was a phantom project.

The group asked Oshiomhole to apologise to the affected communities in Esan North East Local Council in Edo Central Senatorial District and the Federal Executive Council (FEC) for misinforming Nigerians about the good intention of the Federal Government.

At a press conference in Benin City yesterday, PDP Chairman, Chief Dan Orbih, deplored the plethora of allegations being levelled against it by Oshiomhole (the ACN governorship candidate).

The ACN, which asked the PDP to prove that the charges were not real, urged it to report anything untoward to the security agencies rather than misleading the people of the state.

Orbih said his party remained opposed to the use of corps members serving in the state for the election. “So, for any reasonable person if our party was opposed to the use of corps members, how come they are accusing us of sewing corps members’ uniforms for people, who will use them to rig election in favour of PDP?“ he asked.

The PDP boss the party had met with INEC Chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, in Abuja last month, and written three letters to the commission on its position.

ACN Chairman, Mr. Thomas Okosun, insisted that it was a known fact that the PDP believes in bribery and shortcuts to electoral victory, adding that the opposition party had procured vehicles with security logos to move freely during voting and rig the election.

In a statement made available to The Guardian in Lagos yesterday, National Coordinator of EYV, Matthew Idemudia and the Publicity Secretary, Sylvester Osagie, accused Oshiomhole of reorting to the politics of ethnicity, which had culminated in hatred and rejection of the people of Uromi and Esanland by his administration.

Idemudia asked Oshiomhole to conduct himself as the governor of the state and refrain from playing cards of ethnic agenda, which his administration had been severally accused of. The Labour Party (LP) in Edo yesterday kicked off its governorship campaign and accused the ruling PDP at the federal level of worsening the lot of Nigerians since 1999.

At the event in Benin City, the state LP Chairman, Sam Omede, who presented Mr. Andrew Igwemoh and Mr. Austin Odigie as governorship candidate and running mate, said the PDP had failed in the task of improving on the lives of Nigerians.