Gov. Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa State
The presidential and National Assembly elections held on Saturday, February 23, 2019 may have been won and lost, they have continued to be trailed by varied reactions as the governor of Bayelsa State, Seriake Dickson, has rejected the votes garnered by President Muhammadu Buhari, and other candidates of the All Progressive Congress (APC), in Nembe Bassambiri and Southern Ijaw Local Government Areas of the state.
According to a statement by his Special Adviser on Media Relations, Fidelis Soriwei, on Wednesday, Governor Dickson claimed that elections did not take place in Nembe Bassambiri and Constituency 4 of Southern Ijaw.
Said he: “Nigerians should discountenance the purported figures allotted to President Buhari and the other APC candidates based on which they are declared winners of House of Representatives and Senate seats”.
The Governor described the situation in the two areas as “blatant violation of the rights” of the people to elect their leaders and representatives.
Dickson called on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), to cancel the figures from the election which he said never held.
Said Dickson: “Our state condemns the purported result from constituency 4 of Southern Ijaw and the seven Nembe wards.
“We want the world and INEC to know that what happened in Nembe Bassambiri and Southern Ijaw Constituency 4 was a blatant assault on the rights of our people.
“There was no election, no vote. We are calling INEC to announce cancellation and discountenance itself from this charade and investigate and punish all its officers who are complicit in this”.
Buhari emerged winner of the polls after polling a total of 15,191,847 to defeat his closest rival Atiku, who polled 11,262,978, as announced by INEC.
