The Social Democratic Party (SDP) gubernatorial candidate in Saturday’s elections in Kogi State, Murtala Ajaka, has said he will not challenge the election result in court.
Mr Ajaka stated this in an interview on Channels Television on Sunday night, shortly after the poll result was announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The commission declared Usman Ododo of the All Progressives Congress (APC) the winner of the election after obtaining 446,237 votes. Ajaka obtained 259,052 votes and came in second place.
The SDP alleged that INEC officials compromised the process in favor of Ododo and that challenging the result would be a waste of time.
“I’ve been around for the last 20 years. I know what it is. What am I going to do in court when the same INEC who did this is going to come as a witness to defend what he did? Then it’s a waste of time.
“Except the game, the people… because I am enormously disappointed. If the INEC Chairman allows this to continue like this, they will be asking for trouble in Nigeria,” he stated.
Ajaka urged INEC Chairman Mahmood Yakubu to investigate the involvement of electoral officials in the elections.
“In Okene local government they got more than 130,000 votes. Bean! And INEC accepted that result and what is in the BVAS is less than 30,000,” he stated.
“With all due respect to the person of the INEC Chairman, if they do not make a checklist and investigate their officials who went to Kogi State and do not allow this to continue like this, I doubt that there will be elections in 2027. Because people will go I arrive armed at those elections and I fear that Somalia will be child’s play.
“If we knew it would be the same old music, we would have continued it, inflating the results in my area,” he said.
The SDP claimed that it invested a lot of money in the elections to mobilize its supporters because of the transparency promised to it by INEC.
Ajaka said he wasted much of his time in the elections.
“You gave me guarantees that the elections would be transparent, you allowed me to waste my time, spend my money, mobilize my people, just so you could write the results. Even if I’m not sad about it, you hope my followers are happy.
“I assure you that if you allow this to continue as it is now allowed in all states, you are calling for anarchy in this country,” he said.
