The All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) has rejected the outcome of the governorship and house of assembly elections conducted in Zamfara State.
The party has also resolved to challenge the result of the election at the tribunal.
Alhaji Sani Abdullahi Shinkafi, the APGA governorship candidate in Zamfara State, said after due consultation and review of the results declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the party had decided to head to the tribunal.
A statement issued by Shinkafi read: “After consultation with our party members and a review of the outcome of the governorship and state house of assembly elections conducted on 9th March, 2019 in Zamfara State, we reject the results of the governorship and state house of assembly elections.
“The result was not the true reflection of the votes cast. We in APGA reject the result in all its entirety. Party agents in Bindin, Wonaka, Mada, Kware, Kurya, Dansadau, Cigama, and also all areas affected by armed bandits activities across the thirteen (13) Local Government Areas of Zamfara State, said Smart Card Readers were not used at all during the elections.
“The security agents, officials of INEC and the state government’s vigilante group called ‘YANSAKAI’ collaborated to steal the mandate the Zamfara people gave to our party.
“Our party agents told us how security agents, which comprise of the military, mobile Police overpowered them in some areas to manipulate, allocated and altered the results in connivance with INEC officials to turn down the victory of our party in favour of the APC.
“The results were not the true reflection of the votes cast and we have decided to challenge the results of the election at the Election Petition Tribunal. We are also going to challenge the disqualification of APC to field candidates for the elections due to their non-conduct of the party primary in line with the provision of Section 87 of the Electoral Act 2010 as amended.
“We will approach the Election Petition Tribunal on the basis of the irregularities noticed during the elections, and disqualification of the APC governorship, and state house of assembly candidates. Legally, APC has no valid nominated list of candidates submitted to INEC by the national leadership of the party. As far as we are concerned, we did not contest any election with APC candidates. The election was marred with massive irregularities, vote buying, multiple voting, multi ballot thumbprinting, ballot box snatching, refusal of presiding officers across the 2,516 polling unit to write results as announced and declared; ward collation centres were deserted by the ward collation/returning officers of INEC; security agents were aiding and abetting INEC officials in rigging the election in favour of the APC, while the opposition parties were left helpless in the whole exercise.
“There was also the incident of the manipulation of the results in eight (8) Local Government Areas which was won by the APGA governorship candidate with wide margin, but was turned around in favour of the APC governorship candidate. We reject the result and call for its outright cancellation. It is our firm believe that the non usage of the card readers in most of the polling units, which is a violation of the Election Guidelines and Regulation 2019 has rendered the results from these areas invalid and should have been cancelled.
“We condemn the militarisation of the electoral process in various parts of the state. A particular example is the use of the military, mobile Police and vigilante group in Talata Mafara, Shinkafi, Gusau, Maru, Maradun, Tsafe, Kaura Namoda. Mobile Police were also used to alter the result of our house of assembly candidate in Talata Mafara 1. He was whisked away by security agents attached to the Governor A.A. Yari. I am sure a lot of people in Zamfara State will consider it unbelievable the disparity between the numbers of the votes obtained in the presidential election and governorship elections.
“How can the people of Zamfara State could be convinced the APC could get more votes during the governorship election than it got in the last presidential election? I urge all our party members and supporters to be calm while we will follow all the Constitutional means to recover our stolen mandate by the grace of Almighty God.”
