Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Tuesday rejected the decision of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to bar voters from using smart phones and cameras in polling booths during elections.
But the electoral body clarified yesterday that its directive barred the use of the devices only in the polling booth and not around the polling area.
PDP, which raked in N918million from the sale of expression of interest and nomination forms to its presidential and governorship aspirants, spoke through its National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, claiming that the ban was part of INEC’s grand plan to help the All Progressives Congress (APC) to win the 2019 general elections.
During a meeting with stakeholders from Bayelsa East senatorial district in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State yesterday, Secondus said that it was puzzling that the commission would attempt to prevent the use of phones, which he said is the easiest means of communication in the society during elections.
The ban on the use of cameras and recording devices was the strategy of INEC and the APC-led government to rig the 2019 elections.
He argued that the commission by that singular act had sent the country to the dark, primitive era.
“We have all heard what the Chairman of INEC, Prof. Mahmud Yakubu, said about the decision to ban the use of smart phones in the polling units. All over the world, a smart phone is the easiest way of communication.
“What they have said clearly shows that the commission, in connivance with the APC, has perfected a rigging strategy for the next election.
“In fact, INEC has sent Nigeria back to the primitive days. Our position is that INEC is wrong; there is nowhere in the constitution or in the electoral act, where smart phones are banned.
“INEC, if you throw this country to crisis, you will be held responsible.”
A press release by the Special Adviser to Governor Seriake Dickson on Media, Mr. Fidelis Soriwei, also quoted the PDP chairman as restating his opposition to President Muhammadu Buhari’s refusal to sign the Electoral Act Amendment Bill 2018 in a bid to avoid the use of card readers.
“The same plan to rig the 2019 election is responsible for the refusal of the president to sign the amended Electoral Act because the card reader must be used,” he added.
The federal government had introduced an obnoxious suspension of the people’s right to freedom in the country, raising the alarm that more people had been killed in the country in the past one year than those killed in the Nigerian civil war from 1967 to 1970.
He lamented that the APC had introduced dictatorial tendencies that were worse than the repression witnessed under the military.
Secondus also accused the federal government of borrowing N11 trillion in three years in spite of the huge amount of money budgeted yearly to run the government.
Secondus added: “We have borrowed N11 trillion and you don’t feel the impact of the budget except in Daura.
“Nigeria has witnessed nepotism that had never been felt this way in this country.
“The international community is worried about Nigeria. The country is broke, our debt profile has risen to highest level.
“Nigeria is under siege. Freedom and rights have been denied our people. The country is going through very difficult and trying moments.”
In his remarks, Dickson urged the people of the Niger Delta to give the expected support to Secondus in his efforts to lead the PDP to electoral victory in 2019.