ELECTION TRIBUNAL !!

Rivers PDP, APC clash at INEC office
THE Rivers State chapters of the Peoples Democratic
Party and the All Progressives Congress have
disagreed over an alleged power outage at the office
of the Independent National Electoral Commission.
The state APC had blamed the alleged inability of
INEC to provide constant power supply to speed up
the process of providing certified true copies of the
2015 election materials on sabotage.
An APC agent in the state, Mr. Michael Igoli, who was
at the INEC office on Friday to monitor the exercise,
specifically attributed the breakdown of the
generator used by INEC to sabotage.
It will be recalled that the Port Harcourt Electricity
Distribution Company had disconnected electricity
supply to the INEC office, located on Port Harcourt-
Aba road.
But Igoli explained that though INEC provided an
alternative power supply when it became obvious
that PHED would not supply it power, the generator
was salted, a development that led to the breakdown
of the generator.
Igoli, who spoke with The PUNCH at the INEC
premises, added that the development had also
delayed the process of delivering the CTCs to the
tribunal.
He said, "We have had great challenges with power.
Deliberately and curiously, power is the biggest
challenge in INEC office in Rivers State.
"There are issues of PHED bills not being paid, the
PHED line disconnected and the generators of the
commission here have broken down. The one that
was hired eventually was salted. Of course, that is
clear sabotage.
"But so far, so good, you can see that the work is on.
This is what we expected right from when we applied
for certified true copies of all the documents used in
the elections.
"Unfortunately, we did not get them until INEC at the
national level intervened by setting up a task force
that kept the process driven and that caused a whole
lot of delay in the delivery of these materials."
On the other hand, the Deputy Publicity Secretary of
the PDP, Mr. Samuel Nwanosike, described the claim
by the APC as funny and strange, adding that INEC's
generators have been working since the exercise
began.
Nwanosike explained that though he learnt that one
of the generators developed a fault, he was told that
measures were being put in place to fix it.
He maintained that there was nothing like sabotage
or salting of a generator, maintaining that the
allegation was one of the APC's propaganda to gain
public sympathy.
Nwanosike said, "The allegation is funny and strange.
I have been here since morning and I have never
even heard such a story that the generator at INEC's
office here was salted.
"It is a big lie from the APC. As I speak to you, INEC is
discussing how to go and service their generator.
One of the generators has been bad for two months.
The other one has been working.
"As soon as the committee arrived on Wednesday, it
was Thursday when they (committee on certification
of election materials) wanted to start work that the
generator went bad. There is nothing like sabotage by
anybody.
"It is the issue of PHED light. The APC men are also
aware that they (INEC) have been having problems
with the PHED over the payment of bills. They owe
PHED and this issue has been there for over six
months.
"It is shocking to hear them come and lie and turn
around to see how they can curry cheap favour
through propaganda."
When contacted to speak on the matter, the state
INEC Public Relations Officer, Anthonia Nwobi, told
The PUNCH that contrary to the claim, the generators
were working.
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