SPECIAL REPORT: How APC is planning to rig Saturday elections in Lagos
*Allegedly using media guesswork to blackmail the military, Emefiele to drive Igbo narrative against Labour Party
*”It’s all about Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour”
*Emefiele denies media report investigation allegedly sponsored by Lagos APC leaders
*They want to blackmail the military to stop them from coming out to protect voters, their votes on March 18 – Concerned Lagosians
*Say blackmailing the military sign that ruling party seriously frustrated
*Lagos in needless tension: List of flashpoints in state, Buhari called to help
By KEMI KASUMU
“The ruling APC want to rig these Governorship and State House of Assembly Elections in Lagos, and because they know, from the performance of soldiers during the last elections, that it is only the military that can make it difficult for them to rig the elections, they are using media articles to blackmail the military, even under their own government, so that they will not be able to come out for the March 18 electrons.”
The All Progressives Congress (APC) has perfected plans to unleash massive rigging on the upcoming governorship and house of assembly elections in Lagos State.
This they are doing with backing and technical support of a very strong politician still unable to reconcile with the fact that he became the first such strong man of a Nigerian state politics to be beaten by unanticipated political party during the last presidential election.
Although known from the intelligence available by the way he is described fitting more to the person of the party’s top man (names withheld), the source refused to mention a name.
He, however, added that since the top politician relocated from Abuja to Lagos, he has remained in a particular location on Victoria Island, Lagos from where he directs all the activities of his foot-soldiers, to ensure that the state that was “shamefully” lost by the party during the presidential election does not fall finally into the hands of opposition in the governorship and house of assembly elections come March 18, 2023.
Since he has been around and after scolding leaders of his party at the local governments level for not doing enough this leading to his disgraceful defeat last time, several cases capable of sparking before, during and after elections violence have occurred from thugs allegedly working for him against opposition and members of residents community in Lagos.
An unnamed man had issued a video in which he threatened anybody that voted for Labour Party and also challenged the right to life of the LP Governorship Candidate, Mr. Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour should he dare to be elected as governor of Lagos State. There were more.
Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, SP Benjamin Hundeyin, reacted to two videos earlier circulated spreading the same anti-peace threats but, up till the time of filing this report, no update has been issued from the state police command to make public outcome of the promised investigations.
Members of the public losing confidence in the ability of the Nigerian Police to ensure free, fair and credible election that is transparent and accountable has been premised on this lack of feedback on the part of the supposedly foremost security agency.
This is happening at a time fear has enveloped all members of the opposition due to threats and once experienced electoral violence carried out by thugs working for the ruling party in Lagos State.
As a result of this alleged negligence, ineptitude and lack of pro-activeness on the part of state actors, the ruling party’s thugs went ahead to actually unleash terror at dawn on Akere Spare Parts Market, Ajegunle in the Apapa area of the state.
During the invasion of the market, attacked to instill fear in the hearts of Igbo who are believed to have voted against APC in the presidential and will also repeat same in the then yet to be postponed state elections, they killed the security man on duty and set the whole market of the poor Igbo traders on fire.
The fact that there has been no official statement telling the public about the investigation (if any) conducted with a view to finding and apprehending the wicked political actors is another cause for fear that is making opposition decide that the government and its security agencies have nothing to offer in terms of protection of voters and their votes.
To this end, the opposition and members of the public, who said they have seen from the last elections that little or nothing can be expected from government security, are now beefing self security against political thugs in order to protect themselves and stand with their votes by themselves.
In such situation, chaos is possible should thugs invade any polling unit and government security cannot stop attacks on voters, ballot boxes and the people decide to willfully defend themselves and their votes.
This is why the military must be ready to stand up to the challenges in defence of the unarmed voters against the planned electoral violence so as for democratic process to regain the confidence of the people in Nigeria, the report gathered.
It is why the military must be fully on ground beginning from 72 hours ahead of elections doing their show of force in flashpoints across the state. This is because they were the military forces that saved the ground on the last elections day and they have been persistently commended for the brilliant job they did.
Blackmailing the military sign ruling party seriously frustrated – Respondents
But then, to discourage and kill the morale of the military from wanting to come out and not only repeat the good job done the last time but also improve on the performance as the March 18 electrons hold, our investigations exposed stage-by-stage activities of how the now fearful ruling class in Lagos have resorted to using some articles published in the media to blackmail the military.
One of those media propaganda/guesswork was the story they allegedly cooked, ostensibly orchestrated to create an impression of a serving general colluding with Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Godwin Emefiele, to rig the state elections.
It is, however, a narrative The DEFENDER’s investigations have confirmed to be false information and fake news that came to the public within the figment of imagination of the conjurers and purveyors of such “wicked rumours unsubstantiated”.
A report in a section of the media (excluding The DEFENDER) showed how they made one of their first shot titled, “Emefiele in fresh plot against Tinubu, conspires with famous retired General”.
The report impressed that Emefiele purportedly allocated N500 million cash in new notes to Labour Party’s Governorship Candidate. It continued, saying that the CBN governor recruited the General Officer Commanding (GOC) of Victoria Island Army Command – there is no GOC Victoria Island Army Command as far as this report was able to find out – and also alleged that a Retired General rained $2 million cash on the Lagos LP candidate l, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour (GRV).
The report said, “The discredited governor of Central Bank, Godwin Emefiele, is playing his “last card” in the closing chapter of the high-stake power-play that has embroiled Nigeria in the past six months.
“Determined to influence the outcome of the March 18 Lagos governorship polls against ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), the apex banker has handed a whopping N500m in new bank notes to the candidate of Labour Party, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour (GRV), it was gathered at the weekend.”
It said, “Lagos is Nigeria’s economic nerve-centre and the putative stronghold of the President-elect, Bola Ahmed Tinubu,” who despite that was beaten by Labour Party in the presidential election.
It continued: “Labour Party had secured an upset against APC in the February 25 presidential polls in Lagos as its candidate, Peter Obi, scored 582,454 votes, narrowly defeating APC’s Bola Ahmed Tinubu who got 577,606.
“The N500m windfall, which was mobilised through Emefiele’s agents in Lagos, was described as “Oga’s own contribution to the take over Lagos from Tinubu’s influence now that he has won the presidency in Abuja”.”
“The cash bonanza is intended to put GRV at advantage over two other major contestants, incumbent Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of APC and PDP’s Olajide Adeniran (Jandor) whose campaign and mobilisation have been seriously affected by the cash squeeze caused by Emefiele’s Naira redesign.
“Besides, Emefiele, who hails from Igbo-speaking part of Delta State, is said to be an enthusiastic promoter of the “Igbo agenda” to install “our own in Alausa come May 29”.
“To perfect the plot, the cooperation of the General Officer Commanding Officer (GOC) of an elite army division located on Victoria Island, who is of Igbo extraction (name withheld), is also said to have been secured by Emefiele through cash inducement. He is expected to provide “military muscle” to the “Igbo agenda” to take over Lagos. He was said to have similarly played a “spoiler role“ on February 25 by deliberately deploying troops of Igbo extraction to provide “cover” for the massive rigging in Ajah, Lekki areas in favour of LP’s Peter Obi.
“The serving Major General also provided “cover” for the massive rigging reported in Amuwo-Odofin, Ojo, Alaba and Iba areas. For instance, troops at his behest reportedly “detained” the Oniba of Ibala-land in his palace literally, ostensibly to “prevent him from being able able to mobilise his people to vote Tinubu”. Troops similarly invaded the palace of Elegushi in Ikate land and openly brutalised APC supporters in viral videos. Oba Saheed Elegushi is known to be a staunch Tinubu supporter,” end of the report now described as mete conjecture of a media guess work by the ruling party in Lagos State.
The fact-checks
The above media report has been confirmed to be a mere guesswork circulated by ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to whip sentiment against a young Lagos indigene, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, who has come out to prove that Lagos is not just a state with quality owners but also has qualified and capable sons and daughters, who can govern their state effectively.
Although fear of threats to life by agents allegedly working for the now obviously upset ruling party exists with some of our sources, as nobody wanted to be seen saying things that appear to expose the party in power on which strength the threats had been issued, among some others were those that spoke but under strict condition of anonymity.
Speaking on behalf of some concerned indigenes and members of the residents community, who agreed to talk but under strict condition of anonymity, one of sources said the APC, with support of their unnamed “baba Isale”, has perfected plans to rig the Saturday elections and that they have engaged some social media influencers and article writers for publications in the mainstream media to blackmail and sabotage all efforts that Buhari Administration has invested in, to achieve free, fair and credible elections.
He said, “In Lagos, the APC leaders who are now in serious fear as they continue to lose popularity ahead of the elections, are working on possiblity to again cause another technical glitches to incapacitate the INEC transmission of results from polling units via Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and INEC Results Viewing (IReV) portal, so as to enable them stampede INEC staff into doing manual.
“They have also planned to sabotage election materials distribution to various polling units across Lagos State so that accreditation will not start on time until late and voting will now hold till midnight this making it possible for their thugs to still give ballot snatching yet another trial, despite the global shame they caused Nigeria during the presidential and national assembly elections of February 25, 2023,” he said.
On Monday, another concerned Lagosian, who reacted to what was generally described as media guesswork, said that, “If they are trying to cook a story to blackmail the GOC in Lagos as a back up to their Igbo candidate narrative planning to take over Lagos, which is a story inexistent, they should come and tell the world why they are not writing anything about the Commissioner of Police who is a Yoruba officer and under whose watch, his officers and men on duty looked the other way, while polling units were invaded, voters attacked and ballot boxes were snatched during the last elections.
“More saddening, they snatched the ballot boxes and INEC still allowed the sam distorted votes number passed for counting, like in Surulere where one of the APC lawmaker, who has been in Abuja for over six election seasons now, lost his last election but then, ballot snatching occurred and, in the end, surprisingly he too was declared winner by INEC.
“What is funnier is that, they are using all these media wars to blackmail the military but the military must resist their blackmailing tactics.
“The ruling APC want to rig these Governorship and State House of Assembly Elections in Lagos, and because they know, from the performance of soldiers during the last elections, that it is only the military that can make it difficult for them to rig the elections, they are using media articles to blackmail the military, even under their own government, so that they will not be able to come out for the March 18 electrons.
“And because we know that the military have been more committed to strengthening election security in line with the vision of President Muhammadu Buhari, who wants to bequeathe a legacy of credible elections to Nigeria, the military should resist their blackmail by beginning from Wednesday March 15, 2023 three days to the elections day, to run their road show of force and, on election day, they should come out and provide protection to voters and their votes.
“The military should remember how these same politicians in control of powering Lagos endeavoured to rubbish them by the confusion they created during the EndSARS protests of October 2022 and refused to take responsibility, up till today, to the extent that even the reports of their panel they still attempted to distort it in order to discredit the military in the eyes of the globe. So, they should ignore any attempt to blackmail them by the ruling party leaders in Lagos and come out to save Nigeria from being set ablaze from the state,” he appealed.
State of Lagos State electorate
A respondent, asked to comment on his and others preparation for the elections and confidence that his vote will count, said:
“Let me not deceive you. We have activated our voting machines to ensure change in Lagos and nothing, I mean nobody can stop us.
“Let their thugs come. They will be taught a lesson to know that it is not only Yoruba that has the constitutional right to vote in Yoruba Land. That is aside the fact that many of the votes they want to kill Igbo for were cast by Lagos indigenes and other Nigerians who are determined to get involved in the day-to-day administration of their constitutionally bequeathed state.
“What can they be up to after they have been targeting us for attacks and they have been burning our spare parts markets and even threatening to burn more?
“Sadly, they are so ignorant not to know that it is not possible that all Yoruba in Lagos are voting for APC or that all Igbo, Hausa-Fulani here are voting against APC.
“What they are doing now, that they are publicly threatening non-indigenes even though they too are non-indigenes of Lagos State, is unconstitutional, unlawful abd can only destroy the image of Nigeria that President Muhammadu Buhari spent eight years to rebuild.”
Lagos in needless tension: List of flashpoints in state
The concerned Lagosian, too, called on the military to resist the blackmail of the APC and deploy troops in road Show of Force and, on elections day, ensure there is no freedom and time and space for political thugs to unleash terror on voters and the election process and polling units in all the flashpoints across Lagos State. This, he urged, should be done before, during and after the Saturday March 18, 2023 Governorship and State House of Assembly Elections in the state.
Flashpoints in Lagos State
1. Alimosho
2. Oshodi-Isolo, Okota
3. Amuwo-Odofin/FESTAC Town
4. Ojo Local Government
5. Alaba International
6. Ajeromi Ifelodun
7. Shomolu/Bariga/Fadeyi
8. Surulere/Aguda/Itire/Ojuelegba
9. Eti-Osa
10. Ikeja
11. Mushin/Jibowu
12. Lagos Island
This investigated report carried out following a report believed to target the Nigerian military to demoralise them from repeating in March 18, 2023 Governorship and State House of Assembly Elections the brilliant performance they out up at the February 25, 2023 Presidential and National Assembly Elections. Conducted: by Bashir Adefaka and reported by Kemi Kasumu. Published by The DEFENDER – Tuesday 14 March, 2023.
