A prominent member of the Peoples Democratic Party, Osita Chidoka, has strongly criticized the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for its handling of the 2023 presidential election.
Recall that Atiku Abubakar’s PDP and Peter Obi of Labour Party had challenged the declaration of Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the February poll, praying the court to nullify his win on the basis among others that INEC did not do a real-time transmission of results to the election portal.
However, the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT) ruled that INEC had the discretion to transmit results in the manner it saw fit.
Despite the court dismissing the petition and confirming Tinubu’s win, Chidoka held INEC responsible for not fulfilling its pre-election promise to transmit election results electronically in real-time.
He expressed his disappointment during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, faulting the electoral body’s inability to electronically transmit election results in real-time.
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“INEC is a monumental disgrace. INEC is an organisation I am ashamed to be associated with as a Nigerian,” he said.
He said this is because of “the promises INEC made with the Anambra, Ekiti, and Osun [governorship] elections”.
“I came on this programme and called for third-party verification of the INEC system so that we are sure that on election day what is going to happen that day would not lead to a glitch. On election day, INEC said there was a glitch,” the former Aviation minister said.
“Despite not testing the system, it is a shame that INEC went to court to argue that not complying with its regulation does not make it a ground to cancel an election,” he noted.
