A Labour Party witness, Mr. Ochuko Alagba on Tuesday told the Delta State Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Asaba that he was made to sign election results from his ward, which he described as fictitious, under duress.
DAILY POST reports that the Labour Party and its’ gubernatorial candidate, Chief Great Ogboru are challenging the declaration of Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa of the PDP as governor-elect of Delta state by INEC.
During cross-examination by counsels to Gov. Okowa, the PDP and INEC at the resumed hearing of the petition on Tuesday, Alagba insisted that election results obtained in Ward 2, Oshimili South LGA were falsified by agents of the PDP.
He said: “I am the Collation officer for the Labour Party in Oshimili South. On the election day, results were falsified by agents of the PDP from the polling units and sent straight to the local government collation centre.
“At a polling unit in ward 2, some PDP agents and fierce-looking thugs chased my agents away and when I learnt about it, I went down to the polling unit, but was prevented from going into the voting centre.
“After the elections, I wrote a protest letter to INEC where I stated my observation that there was non-compliance to electoral rules in elections in my ward.
Alagba explained that the non-compliance to electoral rules emanated because results from many polling units were not collated at the ward levels before going to the local government for final collation and counting.
“I also made it know to them that results obtained from the wards, which were sent to the local government were falsified and never the true results of voting in polling units across the ward.
“What took place was adding up of fictitious results, there were not the true results of elections in the ward.”
Alagba, who is the Vice-chairman of the Labour Party in Oshimili South, explained that he was compelled to sign the results sheet because of a threat by the local government electoral officer to deny him a copy of the result.
He said: “After what happened at the various polling units, I declined to sign the results sheet but the electoral officer said I will not get a copy of the result if I don’t sign.
“As a result, I had to sign the results sheet under duress because I needed to have a copy to present to my party.”
The witness said that after the signing of the results sheet, he quickly wrote a petition to State INEC office, detailing what transpired on voting day at his ward levels.
He further claimed that on the voting day, many people whose names were not on the voters register were allowed to vote at some polling units in the ward.
DAILY POST reports that at Tuesday’s hearing of the petitions, counsel to the petitioners, Mr. Dele Adeshina (SAN) presented eight witnesses to testify before the tribunal.
The witnesses, among them, Mr. Ochuko Alagba, were subsequently administered to oath, after which they took turn to be cross-examined on their individual written witness statements deposed before the tribunal.
After the cross examinations by counsels to Okowa, PDP and INEC, Mr. Ken Mozia(SAN), Mr. Timothy Kayode(SAN) and Mr. Onyechi Ikpeazu(SAN) respectively, tribunal chairman, Justice Nasiru Gunmi adjourned to Wednesday, September 8 2015 for continuation of hearing.
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