Atedo Peterside, the founder of Stanbic IBTC Bank Plc and Anap Business Jet Limited, said that the results uploaded by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) during the presidential election are an insult to anyone’s intelligence.
In an interview on Tuesday on Arise TV, Peterside said that he was completely disappointed with the electoral body’s performance, which produced Ahmed Bola Tinubu as the president-elect. He praised the steps taken by Peter Obi and Atiku Abubakar of the Labour Party and Peoples Democratic Party, respectively, to challenge the result in court, saying that whatever is agreed upon in court, Nigerians would accept, especially after the judiciary would have done the right thing and be seen to be fair.
“If they go through this process and the judges convince us that everything was done correctly and we adopt the numbers, whoever is the winner, we will congratulate the person,” he said. “But for now it is premature; when I can see with my own eyes what INEC has uploaded, it is an insult to everybody’s intelligence; it is premature; people who are rushing to congratulate him have not taken the trouble to even look at the available information or the evidence. INEC is each to its own.”https://googleads.g.doubleclick.net/pagead/ads?client=ca-pub-2023028789149162&output=html&h=250&slotname=5559997686&adk=987206561&adf=2052623386&pi=t.ma~as.5559997686&w=300&lmt=1678917448&format=300×250&url=https%3A%2F%2Fthenigerialawyer.com%2Fresults-inec-uploaded-are-an-insult-to-anyones-intelligence-atedo-peterside%2F&wgl=1&dt=1678933278668&bpp=3&bdt=5634&idt=8&shv=r20230314&mjsv=m202303070101&ptt=9&saldr=aa&abxe=1&cookie=ID%3D684b4eb87a9ff37f-22f771df94db004f%3AT%3D1675211174%3ART%3D1675211174%3AS%3DALNI_MYWhbb5YWq47CkVlXZ58gy6D22Q8g&gpic=UID%3D00000bd039a7b40c%3AT%3D1675211174%3ART%3D1678933241%3AS%3DALNI_MaFsQ3VfiSB2HFigzxoMAfqeYKxuA&prev_fmts=696×174%2C0x0%2C728x90%2C468x60&nras=1&correlator=8556722341005&frm=20&pv=1&ga_vid=390727257.1675211171&ga_sid=1678933277&ga_hid=1072234309&ga_fc=1&u_tz=60&u_his=13&u_h=768&u_w=1366&u_ah=728&u_aw=1366&u_cd=24&u_sd=1&adx=141&ady=1906&biw=1349&bih=615&scr_x=0&scr_y=84&eid=44759837%2C44759926%2C44759875%2C44777877%2C31073016%2C31072915%2C31073057&oid=2&psts=AD37Y7swskh2QqmncfSu3HMre2xCklxLaVbidXU5ToZMJ3YFObmYxHYjU7Ob9xEjdBWAiWT5Bxx4UnGAi5YdIhD0Iw&pvsid=1160831746412781&tmod=191757151&nvt=1&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fthenigerialawyer.com%2F&fc=896&brdim=-8%2C-8%2C-8%2C-8%2C1366%2C0%2C1382%2C744%2C1366%2C615&vis=1&rsz=%7C%7CleEbr%7C&abl=CS&pfx=0&fu=0&bc=31&ifi=6&uci=a!6&btvi=3&fsb=1&xpc=TRCTETsOzO&p=https%3A//thenigerialawyer.com&dtd=23
In a wide-ranging interview on Arise television where he sought to provide stunning evidence of how results of the presidential election were manipulated in Lagos, Imo, Rivers and Bauchi states, Peterside said on account of what he believes transpired that it was premature to be congratulating anyone declared winner by the Independent National Election Commission, INEC.
According to the activist who acknowledged that he voted for Labour party in the election, “we have become the laughingstock. A football match was played the other day where Liverpool scored seven goals against Man United which got zero. Now one of the jokes in Lagos is that somebody changes the score to read 7 for Man United and O for Liverpool and then says INEC has changed the results. Nigeria is now the laughingstock.”
He then went on to present details of the cases in Imo for instance where INEC has uploaded results for a constituency which is signed by only an INEC official but not a single party polling agent signed, and he said the results which INEC gave showed APC getting 600 votes. “Possibly that INEC can explain this where only their own official Mbakwe signed the result sheet,” Peterside said.
In another case in Rivers state, Labour’s votes of 223 were then switched to APC in a result sheet that is visibly altered, tipexed and according to him bastardized.
He in one polling Unit in Bauchi Local government area, Labour scored 199 votes but when the entire results for the local government were uploaded, Labour’s votes had shrunk to a mere 185 with APC getting 11,862 votes.
Peterside spoke about another situation in Lagos for which he presented two result sheets from the same location. The result sheet claimed by a party agent is clean and without alterations while the result sheet uploaded by INEC has massive alterations and the results clearly had been changed in favour of a political party. “This is the trend that is emerging”, Peterside said.
The ANAP founder said while he has seen results and alterations which even a blind man can identify, he will caution against going on street protests at this point because there was need now to conduct more investigations, present the evidence to the courts and so let us see if the judges will say it is okay to allow these wide spread alterations and results which even a blind person can see as having been bastardized.
Speaking on what to expect for Saturday’s governorship and state house of assembly elections, Peterside said that the electoral commission can’t afford to make the same mistake that questioned its credibility, competence, and impartiality in the presidential election again.
He said that the commission must ensure that once results are collated at the polling units, wards, and local government areas, they must be immediately uploaded, not giving room for any kind of manipulation.
“It is a chance for the INEC chairman and others to redeem themselves; he should insist that everybody upload the results after voting. We cannot have one or two states hold back the result after voting and start thump printing endlessly and claiming that they could not transmit the result. INEC cannot fail twice. They cannot repeat that same mistake.”
Credit: The Nigeria Lawyers