A member of the House of Representatives, for Ekiti North Federal Constituency II, Kolawole Akinlayo, has rejected the outcome of Saturday’s primary election by the All Progressives Congress, APC.
Akinlayo, who described the primary election as a sham, explained that no election was held in his constituency, comprising Ido/Osi/Moba/Ilejemeje local government areas of the state.
Addressing newsmen in Ado-Ekiti, the federal lawmaker said the Saturday election should be cancelled, and a fair and credible polln conducted under tight security.
Insisting that there was no election, Akinlayo said, “That’s a fact, because in the entire Ilejemeje, there was no election. For me, the primary election was a sham, and it was a disgrace to democracy.
“Figures were written. People were in the queue from 8am to almost 11am. Nobody came to attend to them. We saw some men trying to disperse people and results sheets were taken, and they wrote the results.
“Also some government officials came asking to see the electoral officer, and collected the photocopy of the resource sheet, and went away with it and drove them away. I have all the video evidence of all these things happening. So, is that what we call an election? That was not an election. Manipulated figures were announced”, he alleged.
While maintaining that elections should to be credible to be acceptable to all, he said, “It has to be fair and free, but for the one conducted on Saturday there was nothing like an election, it was a sham and a rape of democracy.
“Let the popular candidate emerge. There should be no intimidation. If you know you’re popular, go for a contest, defeat not by using government instruments to intimidate other contestants”.
He said they will all go to the party leaders to present their grievances and explain what happened to them, adding that
he has evidence of what transpired during the exercise.
Akinlayo, however, advice his supporters to remain calm, resilient and to be peaceful. “We are not violent; we will take back our mandate in a lawful way. We will approach the leadership of the party and tell them what transpires with video evidence. We have two agents in each ward monitoring the exercise”.
On those behind the whole issues, he said, ” it’s not the party, it’s some element in the party. We trust the party, we trust the judgment of the leadership of the party. We’ll take it up, and they will resolve it, because I said I have evidence”.
Speaking on the claims that the police have declared him wanted, he said, “The police have not declared me wanted. There was nothing of such. They cannot declare me wanted. I am a serving member of the House of Representatives. I can only be invited and nobody has invited me. And why would they invite me when I am not a criminal.
“I was not in the hotel when they came here. I was in my house. I only stayed in the hotel for two days because my house was fumigated. So I left the place after two days, and I came back to my house”.