Date: 2013-09-19

Pro-democracy activist and Secretary of the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO) Mr. Ayo Opadokun spoke with MUSA ODOSHIMOKHE on the local government election crisis in Offa Local Government Area of Kwara State.

The All Progressives Congress (APC) complained that KWSIEC did not announce the authentic result of the local government election in Offa council. What is your reaction?

We knew, ahead of time, that what happened was going to happen. It was predictable because the power menders and grabbers, who are governing Kwara State in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), have no regards for democracy, its value and culture. They are carrying on in their usual ways – repressive, intolerant of opposing views and have made sufficient efforts to trample on the fundamental rights of our people. So, the verdict of the election, was totally in agreement with expectation, that the so called election was conducted for them to totally sack the only opposing party in the local government in Kwara State.

What they did in Offa, at that election, has an historical dimension. It is historical in the crisis between Offa and Ilorin.

If you see them doing what they are doing today, it is still a continuation of the struggle of quite a long time ago. We suspected that they were going to rig.

So, we advised the progressives, who are in control of the 99 per cent of our people, who will vote against them any day, not to allow it subsists. The PDP can never win in Offa. So, that election was to be used in subjugating Offa, they wanted to ensure that the only local government that was being governed by the progressives was taken over and converted into their local pigeon hole. Unfortunately, the characters cannot understand that the global community today has enough technological apparatus, not only to record events as they are happening, even on video and not only on voice but to capture whatever has taken place accurately.

From all intelligence reports that I have gathered, the progressives ensured that the people came out to vote, monitored and recorded it. They did the right thing by ensuring that votes were recorded and the electoral officers signed at the various polling units. And they gave copies to the agents of the parties, so at the end of the day before five o'clock everything had been completed. But then the electoral officer, who ought to have made the pronouncement, absconded.

A councillorship candidate from the PDP said he did not win the election in his ward. Is this enough proof?

It is the same thing I am talking about. Today, a lot of funny things we used to do like falsifying figures and writing whatever results we feel like and asking you to go to court or tribunals will be extremely difficult now. The media covered it; the APC had over 11,000 votes out of the 12 wards, while the PDP had 4,000 plus votes. How can you now announce the loser as the winner. I am confident that the people will go to court and present the accurate report, but I must let you know that, I am speaking to you from three different perspectives of what I represent. I am speaking in my capacity as the conveners of the Coalition of Electoral Reform (CODER); the main objective of CODER is to ensure that every vote counts, every vote did not count in Offa Local Government. I am speaking also as a political activist, who has devoted a greater portion of my adulthood, working for the entrenchment of the freedom of everybody.

I am also speaking to you as a proud son of Offa; my father was the Ojomo of Offa for 25 years. He died in 2000. My people are not in the habit of surrendering to despotic offers and allurement. You will always have Judases in any community. You will always have characters, who can sell out, but they are in minority. So, I am totally disturbed that in this century, that people can still go this way. It is not funny because, I listened to some of their rationalisation. They say PDP people won in some local governments in Lagos State and they were not given, so why should their own be different?

They have a point but I do remind them that they have not provided any conclusive evidence to prove the point they are making. In this case of Offa, I am confidend, that the people will provide concrete evidence, to prove that PDP, unreasonably rigged the election and did not win. They should not, under any illusion, imagine that they can get away with it as they have done in the past. It has been the nature of the power menders in Kwara State to falsify election results. I am confident that having regards to the information we now have and the way Offa people have reacted, I know that the APC people will want to use all legal and constitutional means to get their rights, that have been trampled upon by these elements, who are undemocratic and intolerant of opposing views. I must say that time is running out against them and they better watch it.

Can it be said APC is not popular, going by the declaration of KWSIEC?

I don't think we should assess the party with this election, why? Against everything, the Justice Mohammadu Uwais Electoral Reform recommended, that the sitting executive, should not appoint the electoral umpire, whether at the state or national level, it has not been heeded. What this amounts to is that, one of the contestants appointed the electoral umpire. Surely, he is very likely going to be favoured during the elections. Therefore, how can you expect genuine result, how do you expect that an opposing political party, that wants power can defeat the person who appoints the umpire? The Justice Uwais panel said the executive in office should not appoint the electoral empire. So, from day one, you can predict what will happen. That cannot be a sensible yardstick to measure the capacity of any of the political parties. If all the political parties are taken on the same pedestal and then they could not win, then you can adjudge them from this position. Now, one of the contestants has appointed the judge. Will you appoint somebody that is not favourable to you? That is the issue. It has been on the pages of newspapers, the people they normally appoint to oversee the state electoral offices are card carrying members of the ruling parties.

But this is obtained in all the states...

I am saying, as the convener of CODER, that it is wrong in the first place. It will not help our electoral system in organising a free and fair election. The recommendation of CODER is the total acceptance of the recommendation of the Justice Uwais electoral reform, which states that no sitting executive should appoint the electoral commission, which is the umpire. And that the National Judicial Council (NJC), should be the body that invites the applicants, who want to be in offices, to apply.