Appeal Court Voids Tai Results …Orders Fresh Rerun

The Chairman, Rivers State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Bro Felix Obuah, has commended the judgement of the  Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt yesterday  which ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), to include Tai Local Government Area among the six LGAs where re-run legislative elections will be conducted on Saturday, December 10.

Obuah in a statement while reacting to the court judgement that the March 19, re-run election in Tai which was suspended mid-way by the electoral umpire was officially approved and binding, and that it would be illegal, illegitimate and morally wrong for the same INEC to want to release election results either in whole or parts from same election earlier suspended, said it has restored the hope of the people of Tai and South East Senatorial District.

He totally agreed with the court’s reasoning that attempting to declare the suspended Tai result would be tantamount to double standards by INEC who ab-initio created the confusion.

The state PDP chairman also commended the orders of the court that no results in whatever form emanating from the suspended March 19 Tai re-run election should be declared by INEC, stressing that the only acceptable re-run election in the area is the expected December 10, polls.

It would be recalled that the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), had approached the court to compel INEC not to declare any results from the suspended March 19, re-run election in Tai LGA against the backdrop of the electoral body attempting to release some of the results against its own order.

Obuah said the court judgement has restored the hope of the people of South East Senatorial District, describing the attempt by the All Progressives Congress, (APC), to get away with victory through the backdoor as a shame and failed mission.

Meanwhile, the Chairman, Rivers State Chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), Bro Felix Obuah says he was impressed with the judgements of the Appeal Court, nullifying the purported election of the two All Progressives Congress (APC) candidates, Andrew Miller and Eldred Braide for Opobo/Nkoro and Degema State Constituencies, respectively, and declaring the candidates of the PDP, Adonye Kelly Diri and Farah Dagogo winners for  the constituencies.

The PDP chairman described the Thursday, December 1 and Saturday 3, 2016, Appeal Court judgments as not only a correction of miscarriage of justice by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) against the authentic winners in the March 19, 2016, Legislative Elections in the two areas, but a further proof of the overwhelming and indisputable popularity and stronghold of the PDP in the state, especially in Opobo/Nkoro  LGA, home of the defeated 2015 APC governorship candidate, Dakuku Peterside.

He also stressed that Diri’s victory has again justified its position that the carcass left of the APC, including Senator Magnus Abe and Dakuku Peterside, can never win any election in the area, having been rejected and deserted by the people of that constituency.

The Rivers PDP  applauded the highly revered jurists of the Appeal Court for taking an unbiased decision and upholding the rule of law, thereby sustaining the dignity of the Judiciary in the face of apparent intimidation and pressure by the undemocratic forces of the All Progressives Congress to subvert the will of the people.

Obuah, who was visibly cheerful over the development, believed that all the claims by Abe and Dakuku about their popularity in the Rivers South-East Senatorial District have been rubbished by Hon Diri’s victory, wondering where else their hope lies in the December 10 re-run elections, if not with the connivance of the Independent National Electoral Commission, their hired security personnel and political thugs to hijack the electoral process and rig the election in their  favour.

He congratulated Diri, who he described as a gallant, unwavering, popular and loyal party man, on his victory, particularly for securing winning votes at the polling units and ward of Dakuku Peterside of the APC in Opobo.

He urged all party supporters to remain steadfast and resist being intimidated to allow electoral fraud freely carried out by members of the APC in the coming election in parts of the state, and particularly charging the electorate in the state to come out en masse and vote for all candidates of the PDP during the December 10, re-run Legislative Elections in the state.