Over 500 persons, most of them thugs, have taken over the main gate and premises of INEC office in Lokoja in order to prevent lawyers and forensic experts of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) from examining documents and materials emanating from the Kogi State November 11 Governorship Elections.
The SDP accused the state governor, Mr Yahaya Bello of deploying the thugs wearing SDP T-shirts and carrying posters allegedly procured by the APC, whose candidate, Usman Ododo was declared winner of the governorship election.
In a press statement issued on Wednesday by Faruk Adejoh-Audu, Spokesman, Muri-Sam Governorship Campaign Council of the SDP, the party said the thugs were reportedly detailed “to attack and sack the (INEC) office to ensure the materials needed for our party to prosecute its petition at the tribunal are compromised,” adding, “Right now, they have seized on the entire Marine Street housing the Lokoja INEC office and several other adjourning Streets, threatening the security of INEC and the entire sensitive materials there.”
The SDP campaign council spokesman further said: “They are chanting war slogans claiming they are “SDP members” who are against the movement of Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS) Machines to Abuja for security reasons and the forensic examination of electoral documents.
“Bello’s desperate resort to this extreme plan of overrunning INEC through an insurrection of rented thugs was after our campaign raised alarm at the weekend to forestall his earlier plan to burn down the Lokoja INEC office housing the materials.
“Curiously, the INEC office shares proximity with the State Police Headquarters, where Bello’s notorious accomplice, one Bethrand Onuoha, is the Commissioner of Police. Onouha’s police did absolutely nothing as hundreds of thugs arrived in buses to take over INEC from the very early hours of this morning.
“We are shocked that other security agencies particularly the Directorate of State Security (DSS) also did nothing to secure the INEC office and the materials despite our official statements in the past few days raising alarm on the plot to attack INEC office by Mr Yahaya Bello who has never pretended about his preference for violence and extra- legal criminal tactics to gain advantage in his dealings.
“Mr. Yahaya Bello must not be allowed to crudely and brazenly rig the November 11th elections in favor of his puppet cousin and thereafter compromise the judicial process by renting thugs to attack INEC and compromise materials needed for evidence.
“We are told that most of the sensitive materials needed for inspection may have even been already compromised by INEC Staff who are his agents and accomplices and are now waiting for this orchestrated attack to claim the materials were lost to the mob.”
The party, however, called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to immediately order the quelling of “this rented insurrection to safeguard our fragile democracy,” warning that if “this extreme criminality” was not quelled then a very dangerous precedent would have been set.
“Our country must demonstrate that no desperate outlaw sitting in an office covered by statutory immunity will be allowed to undermine the very foundation of our constitutional democracy – even if he belongs to the ruling party,” the SDP said.
