Special Adviser to Governor Douye Diri of Bayelsa State on Inter-Party Relations, Dr Jackson Ebi Suokiri, has said Bayelsans across political party lines and affiliations re-elected the State Governor for a second term in office in the recently conducted polls in the state.
Suokiri stated this, recently, in Yenagoa, the state capital, while speaking with newsmen on the aftermath of the November 11th, 2023 Bayelss State governorship election.
He noted that due to Governor Diri’s trajectory of achievement upon his swearing-in into office in his first tenure in 2019, the Governor has demonstrated capacity to lead the state and its people in all ramifications.
He described Governor Diri as one who is prepared for the leadership of the state, emphasizing that the Governor knew the problems and needs of the state before taking oath of office in his first tenure, hence electorates, irrespective of political leanings and affiliations voted en masse to re-elect him for a second term.
The Inter-Party Adviser noted that, but for the COVID-19 pandemic and other natural and politically influenced challenges, which the Governor faced  during his first year, and number of months in office, he would have outperformed what he has already achieved for the state.
Speaking on the alleged cancellation of parts of votes allegedly scored by the All Progressives Congress (APC) in parts of Nembe and the Southern Ijaw Local Government Areas of the state by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Suokiri said going by the extant rules and guidelines of the electoral umpire for the conduct of elections, the INEC was right not to have counted votes from where elections were never held and where the bimodal voters accreditation system(BVAS) was by-passed.
“Infact, information obtained from the INEC IREV, showed that in parts of Nembe LGA, many units in Okpoama, Sylva’s home town in the Brass LGA of the state, and parts of Southern Ijaw LGA,  BVAS weren’t used for accreditation, and yet figures were computed for various political parties, so it showed in the INEC IREV that voting never really took place in those areas.
“Do you expect INEC to count such votes in favour of any of the parties? I commend INEC for this feat. In all the Local Government Area Wards and units were elections were  conducted in accordance with the INEC rules and guiding regulations, the winning margin between the two major  candidates were competitive.
“But a situation where some person’s would hijack electoral materials and then begin to compute scores for their parties isn’t an election again.

“Democracy allows for free, fair and credible competition amongst and between parties in the most modest way, not hijacking and snatching of ballot boxes and maiming of perceived political opponents.

“If Governor Diri and the PDP had wanted to compute scores for themselves in Kolokuma/Opokuma,  that’s the Governor’s home LGA, like the APC did in parts of the state, they’d have done it without anybody querying them, but because the Governor is a Democrat, he chose to allow elections to take place in his Local Government Area.

“In the end, you saw what the APC scored in Kolokuma/Opokuma LGA. That means elections were held freely and fairly even in the Governor’s LGA”, Suokiri added.

By: Ariwera Ibibo-Howells, Yenagoa