By Felicia Udeji
The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has vowed to go to court to retrieve its “stolen mandate in the just concluded Edo gubernatorial election.
It can be recalled that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, declared Senator Monday Okpebholo of the All Progressives Congress, APC, as winner of Edo State governorship election.
The position of PDP came on a day one of the civil society groups that monitored the election, Yiaga Africa, said the election failed integrity test, just as the Centre for Democracy and Development, CDD, asked INEC to review its IReV uploads amid discrepancies.
PDP acting National Chairman, Amb. Umar Damagum, announced the party’s position at a briefing in Abuja, charging Edo people to remain resolute and undeterred as the party would take sure and firm steps to retrieve the mandate with every means legal and available in a democracy.
The PDP stance came as Labour Party, LP, candidate, Mr. Olumide Akpata, who dismissed Saturday’s poll as a transaction and democratic sacrilege by the APC and PDP, said he has submitted the results to lawyers for forensic analysis, which would inform his next step.
INEC had on Sunday night, returned Okpebholo as governor-elect after polling 291,667 votes, against Dr Asue Ighodalo of the PDP’s 247,566 votes and Akpata’s 22,763 votes.
On a day Okpebholo got tons of greetings on his victory from the Federal Executive Council, FEC; governors and some stakeholders, the PDP said it would once again test the level of the preparedness of the judiciary to do justice where it is required.