National Telescope national telescope newspaper
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has dismissed reports that it recognised Senate President Ahmad Lawan and Senator Godswill Akpabio, as senatorial candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
An online newspaper, (not THEWILL) reported Tuesday, that INEC had recognised Lawan and Akpabio as the respective senatorial candidates of the APC for the Yobe North and Akwa Ibom North-West Senatorial Districts.
Quoting sources, the medium claimed that the electoral umpire, “bowed to political pressures”, by allegedly doctoring and backdating a report by INEC on the conduct of APC’s primary elections to accommodate the Senate President and former Niger Delta Minister as senatorial candidates.
But INEC National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, in a statement on Tuesday, described the reports as “spurious”.
Okoye said as evidence of the alleged role played by the Commission, a certified true copy of Form 9C uploaded by their political parties and received by the Commission on June 17, 2022, when the nomination portal closed, was earlier presented.
For clarity, he said the Form EC9 (submission of names of candidates by political parties) is the Form uploaded by parties on the INEC nomination portal.
(The WILL)
