The Peoples Democratic Party’s governorship candidate in Edo State, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, tells BAYO AKINLOYE that the All Progressives Congress may have a hand in the postponed September 10 poll
How did you receive news of the postponement of Edo State governorship poll?
I am very sad that the Edo State governorship election slated for September 10 was postponed. We were prepared for the election. We were confident of winning but all of a sudden we got the news that the poll had been postponed with the authorities citing security challenges. The nature of the challenges we were not told; a new date for the poll had been fixed. It’s a long postponement with the election scheduled to hold on a week day and we were not even consulted. We see this development as a conspiracy by those who are scared (of losing in the poll) and are playing for time. But as law-abiding citizens, anything they want to do, we’ll be ready.
Similar thing happened during the Peoples Democratic Party rule with ex-President Goodluck Jonathan presiding over the country; the general elections were postponed. Don’t you think you should give the current government the benefit of the doubt?
I am sure you know that the reasons given then for the postponement of the polls were not in doubt – insurgency in the North-East was the main reason. The government wanted to ensure that the region was safe enough for people to exercise their civic right. So, the reason was clearly defined and we all knew what happened afterwards: the All Progressives Congress did very well (in that region). If you remove the votes recorded for the party in the North-East I doubt if the APC would have won the presidential election. Whether we like it or not those reasons were valid and the results were clear. But in Edo’s case, what are the reasons for postponing the governorship poll? What are the security challenges? The President (Muhammadu Buhari) was in Edo and two days after it was announced that election could no longer hold due to security challenges. But what are the security challenges? Policemen drafted from their formations to provide security during the poll were already on their way before the election was postponed. They were ordered to go back to their formations. If there had been security challenges would they have been drafted to Edo in the first place?
The truth is this: we are not accusing the president of complicity in this matter. But the postponement made us curious that the governor of the state (Adams Oshiomhole), who is the chief security officer, didn’t raise his voice when it was announced that the election had been postponed due to security challenges. Is that not an indictment on his government? A man who collects N500m monthly for security vote didn’t say a word about security challenges in the state being the reason for the poll postponement. Isn’t that an irony? There was no protest; there was no condemnation. Isn’t it strange for somebody like.....read more...