Ebonyi bye-election: PDP, APGA alleges intimidation, vote buying by APC

Opposition parties in Ebonyi State have alleged intimidation of their party agents and votes buying by the ruling party the All Progressive Congress (APC) leaders in Ebonyi South zone.

The Senatorial candidates of PDP and APGA Bar. Silas Onu and Chief Ifeanyi Eleji respectively, made the accusation when journalists visited their polling units in Ohaozara and Afikpo local government area of the State.

According to Onu “It is probably bye and not an election. That is what we are seeing, especially in Ohaozara local government area. There is no election. The former Governor who has vowed he must win, when you hear somebody say he must win, he is using thugs, compelling people to vote. They are holding people’s hands to thumbprint. When you vote for PDP, they will thumbprint for another party to invalidate it.

“Apart from that, they have been snatching ballot boxes. I do not know what they want to do with it but because the election petition tribunal or the Supreme Court has said BIVAS is of no use, they are now carrying ballot boxes, going somewhere to thumbprint, not caring what accreditation figure in BIVAS will say. Of course, they will get the result sheet, write the accreditation figure, write their result and move on”, he said.

Onu further added that “This is not healthy for democracy. I am satisfied that because of me, the whole APC in Ebonyi South are not sleeping. It says something about the acceptance that I have here. So, I am satisfied to have caused them sleepless nights, I am satisfied to have made them spend so much money to steal the election.

“If I was not in the race, they would have gone to sleep and written their result. The fact that they tried to stop me through a procured court judgement and that did not stop me is a testament to their desperation in this election.

“So, we will review everything. We have one or two areas we already have them by the box and we will see if it happens after the elections. I am not someone who just jumped into an election, I know these things will happen and I know where I will come from to stop them. They should go ahead.

Meanwhile, the APGA candidate in his part said “The conduct is very fraudulent, there are lots of vote buying and intimidation from the Army including INEC officials ordering people to go home after accreditation which means they want to thumbprint the ballot papers. I have called the EO he didn’t pick up and I called the REC she promised to call back since 3 hours ago yet she has not received a harsh reply. There is no hope for this country unless this trend is curtailing. This is an off-season election and there will be data effectiveness in managing the process but is completely flawed. It doesn’t make sense if people in authority can suppress their community”

Meanwhile, Tribune Online witnessed Apathy in most of the polling units visited so far.