BARELY 24 hours after the Chairman of the
Independent National Electoral Commission, Prof. Attahiru Jega, alleged that
political parties set aside funds to bribe parties, the Peoples
Democratic Party, on Tuesday challenged the INEC boss to name
names.
The other parties, the Labour Party and All
Nigeria Peoples Party denied being the parties Jega had in mind.
But while the ANPP said it had no capacity to
offer bribes to INEC and security agents, it claimed that the PDP
must be the bribe giver because “it (bribery) is clearly the practice act
of the PDP.”
The LP said it was too small to bribe INEC
and that Jega must be referring to “the big political parties.”
Jega, at the opening of a two-day roundtable
conference with the theme, “Party Politics in Nigeria and Lobbying, the
Lobbyist and the Legislature,” on Monday, in Abuja, had said that political
parties in the country budgeted money with which to bribe security agents and
officials of the electoral body during elections.
Speaking with journalists in Abuja, the National
Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Chief Olisa Metuh, said that with the results
of the governorship elections in Edo and Ondo states, there was no way
INEC could rig elections in the country.
Metu said, “We heard what the INEC chairman said
that some political parties attempted to bribe INEC officials to help rig or
influence elections, but our response to it is that the INEC chairman should be
honourable enough to mention the names of the political parties involved.
“Under the circumstances of transparent and fair
elections, INEC officials can no longer rig or influence elections as shown
from the result of governorship elections that were held in Edo and Ondo
states.
“We are therefore urging the commission to
mention the names of political parties that offered bribes to it to enable the
PDP reclaim the two states.”
Also, the National Publicity Secretary of the
ANPP, Chief Emma Eneukwu, said the party had never set aside
money for bribing INEC officials and would never do such.
He said, “If we are budgeting to bribe INEC, we
will not be diminishing the way we are in some states.
“If there is any bribery, then it is done by the
PDP, not our party. We only budget for our agents but budgeting for INEC,
it is clearly the practice act of the PDP.”
In his reaction, the National Chairman of Labour
Party, Chief Dan Nwanyanwu, said that the allegation by Jega could be true, but
added that the chairman of the commission should be able to “call a spade a
spade.”
He said Jega must be referring to the big
political parties “that have money and not small parties like Labour Party
that are struggling to meet their obligations financially.
“For him to say such a thing means he must have
been experiencing such pressures from money bags in the big political parties.”
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