Kogi Election: PDP Vows To Resist INEC & Attorney General

Kogi is not a easy nut to crack! It's either APC allow the running mate of late Prince Abubakar Audu to step in and complete the process, or be ready for a long legal battle in different courts of law.

In fact, the PDP has demanded the resignation of the Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, and the Chairman of INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, over the decision to allow the APC to pick a new replacement for its late governorship candidate for Kogi State.

The AGF and INEC had given the APC the go ahead to pick a replacement for the late Audu, who died on Sunday – a day after contesting in the governorship election.

However, the PDP has condemned and rejected the decision.

The party's National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, told the media that the party had asked Malami to vacate his office “for harrying and misleading INEC into arriving at an unconstitutional decision to allow the APC to substitute its candidate in the inconclusive Kogi state governorship election.”

Metuh said the party was shocked that INEC could allow itself to succumb to the antics of the APC “by following the unlawful directive of an obviously partisan AGF to substitute a candidate in the middle of the ballot process.”

The PDP described the decision of INEC and the AGF as bizarre, saying, “We are all aware that the two legal documents guiding INEC in the conduct of elections; the Constitution and the Electoral Act, have provisions for electoral exigencies as well as empower the electoral body to fully take responsibility for any of its actions or inaction without undue interference from any quarters whatsoever.

“We are therefore at a loss as to which sections of these two relevant laws, INEC and the AGF relied on in arriving at their bizarre decision to substitute a dead candidate in an ongoing election even after the timelines for such has elapsed under all the rules.”

- Funny enough, what PDP is not saying is that INEC made a mistake to declare the election inconclusive in the first place, because the remaining votes from the 91 wards can never give PDP victory.

The easiest way out of this saga is for APC to allow Hon Faleke to continue the election and nominate a new running mate for him.