Seriake Dickson Leads as Battle shifts to Southern Ijaw

Based on the results announced on Sunday December 6, 2015, by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Governor Seriake Dickson, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, who is seeking re-election in the Bayelsa State governorship poll, was leading by a slim margin over his closest rival and candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr. Timipre Sylva.

The returning officer for the election and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Calabar, Prof. Zanu Akpagu, presided over the results as they poured in from only five of the eight Local Government Areas of the State.

Results from the five council areas saw Dickson beating Sylva in Kolokuma/Opokuma, Sagbama, Ekeremor and Yenagoa, while Sylva won only in Brass. After the announcement of the five local councils, Dickson led Sylva by 25,415 votes.

However, for inexplicable reasons, INEC chose not to announce the results for Ogbia — former President Goodluck Jonathan’s council and Nembe where elections were held on Saturday, stating instead that the results would be made public this Monday December 7, 2015, at 10 am.

The returning officer for Yenagoa said 16 polling units in the local council were cancelled due to ballot snatching, violence and attack on electoral personnel; that of Sagbama said elections did not hold in six polling units because of malfunctioning card readers and election violence; in Brass, the election did not hold in some areas owing to violence while election results were cancelled in six polling units due to over voting.

Similarly, in Ekeremor, the returning officer said there was cancellation in some wards due to ballot snatching, violence and over voting.

But the bigger headache was Southern Ijaw Local Government Area where the election was postponed to Sunday due to an outbreak of violence in the council on Saturday.

Despite the postponement, there was still mayhem yesterday in the local government, which is the largest in terms of the number of registered voters and is expected to determine the outcome of the election, as heavily armed Niger Delta militants in the area had a field day intimidating voters, party agents and INEC officials.

In the melee, about 20 members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) were held hostage by the militants at Ekowe Police Station in Southern Ijaw.

Also, soldiers on election duty at Oporoma, headquarters of the council, stopped the police from transferring APC thugs arrested with guns.
The thugs were believed to be working with an ex-militant leader, General Africa, who is from Olugbobiri.

But they were not as lucky in Opuama, Eniwari, Ekowe, Egbomotoru I and II communities, where security personnel escorting electoral materials were overpowered by armed thugs and all the electoral materials taken away.

According to reports, the Eniwari community was also invaded by heavily armed thugs, who fired sporadically into the air.

Reports also had it that one Major Sanni, who was the officer in charge of the alleged illegal operation in Southern Ijaw, said he was acting on the strict instruction of the Minister of Defence, Mallam Dan Ali, who incidentally was the same person who conducted the primary that saw Sylva emerge as the APC governorship candidate after the botched primary earlier conducted by Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State.

Despite the hijacked materials, INEC officials were seen forcing their ad hoc staff, including the corps members, to travel to various units around 6.30 pm to conduct the election.

Concerned that the election might take place in the dark as a result of lack of electricity, and the militants could have a free reign to create havoc, Dickson raised the alarm over the decision to hold the election after nightfall.

A media aide of the governor, Mr. Francis Agbo, who spoke to THISDAY, alleged that INEC insisted on conducting the election in Southern Ijaw last night at all cost so as to rig the local government poll in APC’s favour and offset Dickson’s lead in the poll.

According to him, “INEC is insisting on conducting the election in Southern Ijaw this night at all cost to rig the place for APC so as to cancel Governor Dickson’s lead in the poll.

"So far, we have won in six local government areas, while Sylva won Brass. The eighth local government – Southern Ijaw – is where they want to take to cancel the lead.”

He said the governor had summoned a commission of enquiry to investigate the atrocities perpetrated by officials of state, whether federal or state government, to answer to the crimes against the people of Bayelsa State.

Equally, the senator representing Bayelsa East in the National Assembly, Senator Ben Murray Bruce, promised to head to court if more deaths were recorded in Southern Ijaw due to INEC’s insistence on holding the election in remote creeks in the dead of the night.

He said he was less concerned about which party wins the election, but was more interested in the wellbeing of the people who might be exposed to violence that could be unleashed by militants desperate to rig the election.

“There is no electricity in these areas that are very remote, so I have made it clear to the INEC chairman, the electoral commissioner in charge of this state, the IG and DIG that if any death is recorded again, I shall launch an enquiry and head to court to ensure that they are charged for murder,” he said.

In its reaction to the Bayelsa poll, the leadership of the PDP alleged yesterday that it had unearthed a plot by the APC to rig the election in the areas in which voting was rescheduled for yesterday in the state.

In a statement issued by the National Publicity Secretary of PDP, Chief Olisa Metuh, the party said it was alerting “all concerned that the APC and the military have connived to rig the elections in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State”.

“This rigging is being coordinated by the same Army Major who supervised the killings yesterday. The Major has handed most of the sensitive materials to APC agents to fill and return as results in the evening,” he stated.

According to him, the Southern Ijaw Local Government Area is the largest in the state and the APC wants to use this scheme to inflate figures in favour of their candidate.

Also, the PDP has asked President Muhammadu Buhari to steer clear of Bayelsa governorship election and allow the will of the people to prevail, if he is really desirous of sustaining the nation’s democracy.

Metuh in another statement alleged that intelligence reaching the party showed that Buhari was neck-deep in APC’s desperation to forcibly take over Bayelsa State, “for which he has directed a covert military and other security operations to assist the APC to rig the election, which has already been won by the PDP”.

“At the head of this illegal military operation is one Capt. Louis, who led the hijacking of elections in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area, the largest in the state.

“Military personnel have seized ballot materials including result sheets in Igbematiru, Peremabiri, ward 3, ward 6, ward 8, ward 12, ward 13 and ward 15, which they took to Ologbobiri in military gunboats, where massive thumb-printing is going on in favour of the APC. In Ward 7 Ekowe, the military hijacked and destroyed voting materials.

“During this operation, the ruthless personnel manhandled NYSC members serving as ad hoc electoral officers, some of whom were thrown into the water and would have drowned if not for well-meaning Nigerians who rescued them.

“The PDP therefore states that the political development in Southern Ijaw is the worst in Nigeria’s electoral history and is no different from the military coup of December 31, 1983.

“Furthermore, we are aware that the ongoing operation is intended to inflate figures in favour of the APC and cancel PDP’s obvious victory in this election.

“We therefore expect that INEC should not announce any cooked-up result coming from Southern Ijaw, which does not reflect the wishes and aspiration of the people,” he said.

In the same vein, PDP in the state cried out that APC was trying to use the rescheduled election in the Southern Ijaw to rig the governorship election held on Saturday in the state.

The state chairman of the party, Chief Serena Dokubo-Spiff, made the claim in Yenagoa yesterday while calling for the postponement of the election in Southern Ijaw, warning that the issues, which led to the postponement of the election in the council, had not been adequately addressed.

However, the police in the state made it clear yesterday that the state governor had no business going to Oporoma, the headquarters of Southern Ijaw, stating that the action was in breach of the law which forbids candidates from moving outside the vicinity of the polling units where they were registered to vote.

The police also dismissed claims of killings in Southern Ijaw on Saturday, as alleged by the PDP.

However, the PDP chairman insisted that the governor was within his rights to visit Oporoma, because he is the chief security officer of the state.
He stressed that the governor visited the council headquarters because of the large scale of violence unleashed on the people by suspected APC thugs and the large number of casualties recorded before the election was postponed in the local government area.

The PDP claimed it had uncovered a plot by INEC and the security agencies to rig the Bayelsa governorship election in favour of APC.
The party wondered at the decision by INEC to go ahead with the conduct of the rescheduled election in Southern Ijaw in spite of the protests by the people and even the ad hoc staff of the commission who complained of security threats.

The party said that the lateness in the commencement of accreditation of voters and voting exercise, as well as inadequate security for yesterday’s poll, among others, was a pointer to the fact that the electoral body had concluded arrangements to announce the APC candidate as the winner of the election.

Dokubo-Spiff said it was wrong for INEC to have ordered that the accreditation and voting should go on simultaneously.

Describing this development as part of a “sinister plot” to upturn the already declared results through voodoo votes, the PDP state chairman said it was “unheard of and undemocratic”.

According to him, “We the PDP, hereby say that this is irregular, improper and unacceptable. We would resist it. We must commit to doing the right thing in this country.

“The Resident Electoral Commissioner, Mr. Baritor Kpasih, should stick to doing the right thing.

“How can you say that accreditation and voting exercise should go on simultaneously in a place like Southern ijaw that has geographical components as far flung as from here to Siberia?

“We fear that they are intending to do some mago mago (Pidgin English for cheat) that would not be accepted and we are saying this emphatically for the record.”

The chairman disclosed further that while the election was ongoing in Southern Ijaw, the APC candidate was in Abuja strategising with some highly placed INEC officials on how to win the election through the back door.

He stated that part of their plans is to use the Southern Ijaw result to offset the results from other local government areas where the PDP had a comfortable lead.

PDP called on the INEC to carry out its statutory function in accordance with the law and not allow itself to be used to perpetrate electoral fraud.
Dokubo-Spiff added that it would be foolhardy on the part of any of the federal agencies responsible for the conduct of a credible election in the state to upturn the will of the people.

The Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police in charge of security during the election, Mr. Hashimu Arugugun, countered the PDP claims, saying that nobody was killed in the area as reported in the media.

He also said that only 10 persons were arrested in connection with disturbances in Southern Ijaw.

“Sunday INEC officials and security agencies met and agreed that the only local government, Southern Ijaw where the election could not take place due to logistics problems and a few other areas where the election could not take place, the election will take place today, Dec 6th, 2016.

“The report that some people were killed could not be confirmed, as corpses of the purported dead persons could not be traced and their particulars could not be obtained from any source.

“Information at my disposal is that there was no death in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area,” he said.

On Dickson breaching the electoral law by going to Oporoma and INEC’s collation centre yesterday, Arugugun said the command was investigating the matter to confirm if it was true.

He described the stories of killings of persons in Southern Ijaw as "mere rumours,” adding that rumours were mere “psychological projections”.
Arugugun insisted that restriction of movement was still in force in the affected areas where the election held yesterday.

The police boss disclosed that he deployed two commissioners of police, two brigade commanders, five battalion commanders and a deputy commissioner of the NSCDC to Southern Ijaw to ensure safety of lives and property in the area.

“Nobody should entertain any fear as security is guaranteed and the security agencies are ready so nobody should take us for granted,” he said.
On why election could not take place in Southern Ijaw on Saturday, Arugugun blamed it on logistics, but admitted that the police command recovered five AK47 rifles and one berretta pistol from some hoodlums, adding that all the arrests made were in connection to the possession of fire arms and other related electoral violations.

Just as the PDP and Dickson called for the stoppage of the rescheduled governorship election in Southern Ijaw, the APC governorship candidate yesterday called for the cancellation of the election already held in Ekeremor and Sagbama local councils in the state.

A statement by the spokesman of the Sylva campaign organisation, Chief Nathan Egba said: “Following widespread violence, security breaches and election manipulation that was carried out by Governor Seriake Dickson and his party the PDP in parts of Bayelsa State during last Saturday’s governorship election, the Sylva/Igiri Campaign Organisation hereby calls for the cancellation of results from Ekeremor and Sagbama Local Government Areas of the State.”

He said it was a well known fact that over a thousand armed men suspected to have been imported from Delta and Rivers States by Dickson stormed Ekeremor community where they unleashed terror on the entire community from the wee hours on election day before they were repelled by the army, “only for them to return in the evening when results were about to be collated”.

“The gunmen we suspect were hired for the sole purpose of assassinating the Hon. Minister for State, Agriculture, Senator Heineken Lokpobri, as they launched a sustained attack on his residence with grenades, dynamite and gunshots for hours before the army repelled them.

“He was very lucky to have survived, as they returned in the evening to continue till they were again repelled by the army.

“But in the meantime, they had carted away sensitive election materials to manipulate in favour of PDP and returned for collation.

“In Sagbama Local Government Area, the home of Governor Dickson, the youths who were again said to have been brought from Delta and Rivers States, also hijacked the materials that were meant for all the riverine communities in the LGA including the ward of the former acting governor of the state, Nestor Binabo. Other wards where election did not hold, include wards I and II.

“The violence, which cut across the state, largely took place in parts of Sagbama, Ekeremor and Southern Ijaw LGA, where election was later rescheduled,” he alleged.

The Sylva campaign team called on INEC to cancel the election results in the two local government areas of Sagbama and Ekeremor and reschedule the exercise.

The Sylva-Igiri campaign also condemned “the continuous breach of electoral laws by Governor Dickson when he stormed the Yenagoa LGA collation centre last night to threaten APC collation agents and this morning when he went to Oporoma against the law and also with full security detail against the IG’s directive”.