The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Monday warned that the Ekiti people would resist attempts by anybody or group to rig the state’s governorship election slated for July 14.
In a statement issued by its spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, the PDP cautioned the All Progressives Congress (APC), Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and security agencies against attempts to toy with the will of Ekiti people.
The statement read: “PDP restates that the will of the people is stronger than the machinations of evil-minded persons, who are toying with the determination of the people for a free and fair electioneering.
“The party warns that INEC officials working with agents of the APC to compromise the process are brazenly risking the legitimate wrath of the people of Ekiti State in their iron-cast resolve to ensure that nobody subverts their will in this election.
“The people of Ekiti State are already aware of the clandestine meetings between known INEC officials and APC agents, including those held at the Ondo State Government House in Akure, where plots were hatched to use INEC’s ICT Department to preload card readers and input false results, as well as cloning unclaimed Permanent Voter Cards (PVC) to superimpose pictures of their members from other states.
“The PDP cautions these compromised INEC officers, their allies in the APC and those they planned to import from other states, to note that their tracks and footprints are all bare and that the people of Ekiti State are already at alert and ready to stop them on their trails with every potency available to them under the law.
“What the APC and their cohorts in INEC fail to note is that Ekiti is a contiguous state where every indigene and residents know and can identify one another other as individuals and families and that as such there is no way in which strangers imported from other states can be allowed to sneak in and participate in their election.
“Let it be known to all that the PDP is fully mobilized for the July 14 election. The people of Ekiti State are fully rallied to vigilance at every polling unit, every collation center as well as every exit and entry points in their respective areas across the state to ensure that nobody subverts their collective will.
“We restate the fact, clearly known both to INEC and the APC, that Ekiti State is a stronghold of the PDP and that the people are solidly behind the PDP, particularly due to the sterling performance of Governor Ayo Fayose in developing the state in all spheres of lives.
“The APC and their rejected candidate should therefore end their desperation to forcefully take over the state as no amount of machination, intimidation, threats or even arrests and detention can subjugate the people of Ekiti State, on any score, let alone, on their governorship election.”
