Nathaniel Zacchaeus, Abuja

Residents of Kaduna State under the auspices of Restoration of Kaduna Mandate besieged the headquarters of the Independent National Electoral Commission in Abuja on Thursday to protest the conduct of the March 18 governorship and House of Assembly elections in the state.

The people were led by their Spokesperson, Edward Auta, and Convener, Hadwyah Samuel.

They demanded an immediate review of the entire results and the sacking of the INEC Administrative Officer in the state, Mal Auwal Mashi.

They displayed placards containing various inscriptions.

The protesters arrived at the INEC headquarters in the Maitama district of Abuja around noon chanting solidarity songs.

They were received by the Deputy Director in charge of Security at the Commission, Ndidi Okafor, on behalf of the INEC Chairman, Mahmoud Yakubu.

Addressing journalists and the representative of the INEC Chairman, Auta alleged that the Kaduna Governorship Election, “was sort of a democratic process as the outcome did not reflect the choice of the people or complied substantially with the provisions of the law.”

He noted that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) was meant to prevent multiple voting, uploading of results to the INEC IREV portal, and collation at the polling units was ignored

He said, “We also witnessed the arbitrary cancellation of results in strongholds of the opposition, and all efforts to draw the attention of the INEC officials to use the results already uploaded on the IREV portal to address the concerns of agents were also refused.

“In particular, the entire results of the election in Kukui ward of Kagarko Local Government with 6084 registered voters and all permanent voters cards (PVC) collected were cancelled at the ward collation centre.

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He said this was done despite protest against that by party agents, knowing that all polling units result sheets have been uploaded on the IReV. Our members observed how collation centre in Kaduna South, Igabi, Birnin Gwari, Zaria, Lere became cancellation centres.”

The group also alleged that security agencies were compromised by the ruling All Progressives Congress in the state in collaboration with some INEC officials.

Auta said, “It was also clear that the manipulation of the elections in many areas was supervised and aided by some corrupt agents of the security forces.

“In Birnin, Kachia, Kagarko, Lere, and Kudan LGAs, there were incidences of such fraudulent activities, which ultimately proved effective in altering the election outcome in favour of the APC candidate.

“Because the law provides for a seven-day window for INEC to review the results of an election where pieces of evidence of widespread irregular abound, we call on the commission to immediately commence the review of the results of the governorship elections in Kaduna State to ascertain the true winner of the elections.

“We demand that no certificate of return should be issued to the candidate of the APC or anyone for that matter unless this process is concluded and resolved in his favour.

“We demand the immediate sack of the INEC Administrative Officer, Auwal Mashi, who colluded with the APC and supervised the rigging of the elections in the state.”

Okafor, who received the group’s letter of protest, commended them for their peaceful conduct and pledged that INEC would study their petition and take necessary action.