We’ll resist attempt to rig the election, Ekiti people, political parties warn

VARIOUS stakeholders in Ekiti State have expressed readiness for the governorship election in the state scheduled for Saturday, and also warned that they would take action should anything go against the rules in the conduct of the polls.

A cross section of Ekiti people, who spoke with Sunday Tribune, on Saturday, said they were ready and would vote, while a few others in response also said they would not vote as they said they are not interested in who wins the election.

A resident of Ikere-Ekiti, Mr. Odunlade Akinyemi, who said he’s a “fresh graduate”, said “as far as I’m concerned, we are ready in Ikere-Ekiti to cast our votes. My friend and I are ready and we have our voter cards.”

On whether they were worried that their vote might not count as there were allegations of plans to rig the election, Akinyemi said “that will not be allowed.”

According to him, “there are many devices through which we will monitor the election, such as mobile phones and other devices. Whatever we observe or notice where we would vote, we will report instantly.”

Mrs. Oluwaseun Ajao, a trader in Ado Ekiti, while responding to Sunday Tribune, said “she is ready and will vote on Saturday,” adding that she and her husband would be voting in their native Iyin-Ekiti community.

Speaking on threats of attempts to rig the election, Mrs Ajao said: “In my polling booth in Iyin, we do not allow rig the election. In our Ward A in Iyin, you dare not rig the election the election. There’s no way you would rig the election because all the people there will not allow that. I, for instance, cannot allow cheating, we will raise our voices, and we will resist any attempt to manipulate the election.”

Spokesperson of the Social Democratic Party, Mr. YemiAkinbode, while expressing the readiness of the SDP and its candidate, Mr Akinloye Aiyegbusi, for the election, said it was normal for some people to attempt to manipulate the process.

The SDP spokesperson said it was normal to think that some people would rig the election the election “but we believe that power belongs to the people and Ekiti people are very vigilant; they know what they want.”

Akinbode said Ekiti people have seen both the APC and PDP and are tired of both parties, and they want a better alternative which the SDP has provided.

Also expressing his party’s readiness for the poll, publicity secretary of the PDP, Mr Jackson Adebayo, said “I can assure you that PDP will secure at least 70 per cent of the election unless if people are not allowed to vote at all.”

Adebayo said his party had been “campaigning from house to house and the responses have been tremendously assuring, because Ekiti people have made up their mind not to accommodate APC in the political space again.”

The spokesman of the JFK Campaign Organisation, Mr. Wole Olujobi, who expressed confidence that Dr Fayemi was ready and would win the election, said the people were “tired of the misrule of the PDP in the state and “are eagerly waiting to get rid of them from the state.”

Olujobi said the APC had campaigned vigorously in all parts of the state, “and we are confident because many former PDP bigwigs who won the elections for the party have defected and joined us in APC. Including a former minister, serving House of Assembly members and many others, from all parts of the state.”