#Elections2023: Asking INEC Chair To Step Down Illegal, APC Replies PDP, LP, ADC
The All Progressives Congress has kicked against the call by the Peoples Democratic Party, the Labour Party and the African Democratic Congress for the resignation of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Mahmood Yakubu.
The APC presidential campaign council in a counter press conference on Tuesday, shortly after the opposition parties’ news briefing, said the presidential and National Assembly elections held on Saturday were credible enough.
Speaking, the spokesman for the APC campaign council, Festus Keyamo, said it was “legally wrong” to call for the altering of the electoral process when the results had not even not even been declared.
“They actually called on President Muhammadu Buhari to intervene; to interfere with the process. First of all, those demands are not possible under the law,” Keyamo said.
The PDP, LP, and the ADC in a joint press conference on Tuesday, in Abuja, alleged that the February 2023 presidential and National Assembly elections were marred with violence, rigging and intimidation of voters.
The parties demanded the conduct of fresh elections, and asked the INEC boss, Yakubu, to step aside.
The Minister of State for Labour and Employment added that the request by the opposition parties were against the provision of the Electoral Act, saying the results collated by the state returning officers could not be tampered with by the INEC chairman.
“When they (the results) come to the national collation centre, the national chairman has no power under the law to review what all those returning officers have done,” he said, adding that all complains should have been resolved at the ward, local government area and state levels.
Keyamo said only the election tribunal could interfere with the process.
The APC PCC thereby asked the aggrieved parties to approach the court if they had cases.
