•‘Ibekaku-Nwagwu suffering from post-defeat nightmare’
Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for Enugu West, Mrs. Juliet Ibekaku-Nwagwu, has rejected results of the zone. Ibekaku-Nwagwu, who addressed reporters in Enugu yesterday, said the election was fraught with gross irregularities.
She said: “We regret the fact that the National Assembly elections in Enugu State was fraught with gross irregularities, including outright hijacking of ballot boxes and ballot papers, non use of smart card readers and indiscriminate thumb printing.
“There was also vote buying and inducement of the electorate. We assure our supporters that their votes will count. We join the state chapter of APC to reject the outright stealing of their votes by Senator Ike Ekweremadu and his thugs who disguised as INEC officials.
“In his desperation to return to the Senate, Mr. Ekweremadu deployed the people’s stolen wealth to brazenly compromise electoral officials while using thugs to threaten and scare away voters from the polling units.
“PDP and Ike Ekweremadu represent the sad past where election results were written in the bedrooms of local government chairmen. He cannot represent the leadership that our people are yearning for. We reject the results announced by Enugu state INEC and will contest it.”
But the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has dismissed her allegations as post-defeat hallucination
A statement yesterday by the Director-General of the Enugu West PDP Campaign Organisation, Okey Ozoani, said Ekweremadu never took her seriously as “she was a non-starter and an unknown quantity”.
The statement reads: “Much as we have no issues with the decision of our sister, Mrs. Ibekaku-Nwagwu, to actualise her senatorial ambition in her place of birth rather than her place of marriage, her abysmally poor knowledge of Enugu West, misalignment with the challenges and aspirations of our people, coupled with her incurable quarrelsomeness, promotion of thuggery and blackmail, and lack of respect for elders and distinguished sons and daughters of Enugu West, make her unelectable.
“However, it is not our wish to join issues with her over her rants, as she pitiably suffers from nightmare over her humiliating defeat.
“A chronic attention seeker, Ibekaku-Nwagwu could never have been a match for the Deputy Senate President, even if he had chosen to snore in his bed, holiday abroad or cede 50 per cent of votes cast to her ahead of the election.
“Her request to the public, rather than APC accredited polling and collation agents, to send information and evidences of election malpractices against Ekweremadu shows that she is a malicious rumour manufacturer and peddler.
“It also shows why her fallacious claims are at variance with the views of local and international observers and journalists. It is unfortunate that while Ekweremadu and PDP are making history, Mrs. Ibekaku-Nwagwu is busy making hysteria.”
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