Edo Poll: How Obaseki Caused PDP’s Loss – Idahosa; Insists Election Was Free and Fair

Follow

( 0 Followers )

X

Follow

E-mail : *

Follow Unfollow

Contrary to widespread allegations that the September 21 governorship election in Edo State was rigged in favour of the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, (APC) Senator Monday Okpebholo, a former member of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the People’s Democratic Party, (PDP) now a chieftain of the APC, Charles Idahosa, has accused Governor Godwin Obaseki’s friends in Lagos and in the media of orchestrating that narrative of rigging, insisting that the signs were there that the PDP was not going to win the election.

In a media chat on Sunday, Idahosa, a former member of the Board of the Nigerian Railway Corporation, (NRC) attributed the PDP’s failure to the governor’s inability to manage people, and his perceived high level of ingratitude. He asserted that the election was very free and fair.

According to him, “It is rather unfortunate the feelings of the PDP that the election was not free and fair. As far as I am concerned, the election was very free and very fair. I gave an interview days before the election, and I did say that Godwin Obaseki was getting frustrated and threatening here and there and I made it quite clear that it has dawned on him that this is the first time he is going for an election on his own.

“In the first election, we were with him, and when he fell out with the APC and crossed to the PDP, a chunk of members of the APC went with him. And when he got to the PDP, he did exactly what he is good at doing – he abandoned every person, and he started messing up again in the new party which is the PDP to the extent that the party was broken into two which became the Legacy PDP and the New PDP.

“His position is nothing strange, and his people in Lagos and in the media are helping him to orchestrate that story that the election was rigged, and I am very disappointed in most of them, and they try to target the APC candidate who is a very humble person who went about his campaigns dealing directly with the people, dealing directly with the grassroots. But they are angry in Lagos that he did not come to their studios in Lagos or Abuja, and I am very disappointed in them.”

On PDP’s resolve to challenge the result of the election in court, Idahosa said “What is happening now is that they are just looking for reasons, but I want to remind them that going to court is part of the electoral process. Obaseki was taken to court twice; when he won the election in 2016, the case got to the Supreme Court. When he won again in 2020, the case got to the Supreme Court so, there is nothing wrong with going to the court. I feel sorry for the person who got the collateral damage; but instead of them going and settling down, they said they want to go to court. That is another spending of huge money.”

Stating that the signs were there that the PDP was not going to win the election, Idahosa said “But those who were with him, I don’t know how they thought Obaseki will win that election. I don’t know how they expected the PDP to win that election after all that he committed.

“Here was a man that deprived 14 elected lawmakers from being sworn in. We are talking of 14 constituencies out of 24 and you said they can go to hell; and for four years, you prevented them from being sworn in and you think their constituents and their relations, and their friends will clap for you.

“Here is a man, NJC (National Judicial Council) cleared eight judges, and you sat down in your office and cancelled three. And according to his mouthpiece, because there were petitions against them. If there were petitions, is it the governor such petitions should go to or the NJC?

“All the leaders that worked for him, he drove them away. He gathered people and said he would burn down Nigeria and that he would lead; the whole world saw it, but I have never seen his friends in the media mention it.

“When he was still coming around me, I asked him if there was any examination he sat for where he took first that made him governor. It was people that gathered that made him governor, but he drove everybody away. PDP leaders came to Benin for a rally, he knows the tradition, but instead of taking them to visit the Oba of Benin, he took them to a private residence whereas when the Vice President came with the APC candidate, he visited the Oba of Benin, and this was few days to election how. Did he expect to win the election with all these controversies surrounding him? There was nobody that he did not deal with.”