Group Raises Alarm Over Plan By INEC To Backdate Form Submission Date of Delta APC Candidates

A group, Delta Central Truth Movement has called on the Chairman of Independent National Electoral Commissioner, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu and INEC Director of Legal Services to call to order some corrupt officials of the commission over their alleged sinister move to back-date the date of submission of Delta APC National Assembly candidates from 18th October, 2018.


It would be recalled that a Federal High Court sitting in Asaba, the Delta State Capital on October 17th, 2018 restrained the National Working Committee (NWC) of the All Progressives Congress (APC) from submission of list of party candidates from Delta State for the just concluded 2019 elections to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

The All Progressives Congress (APC) is 1st respondent in the suit, National Chairman of APC, Adams Oshiomhole was joined as second respondent, while the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Prophet Jones Erue as the 3rd and 4th respondents respectively.

In the ruling by Justice Toyin Adegoke, all parties to the suit were ordered to maintain status quo and desist from submission of list of candidates to INEC till the substantive suit was heard.

But on 18th October, 2018, the National Working Committee of the APC in disobedience of the court order, submitted the names of candidates for National Assembly election in Delta state, which include Senator Ovie Omo-Agege, Rev. Francis Ejiroghene Waive and others on 18th of October, 2019 and two weeks later they submitted gubernatorial and State House of Assembly candidates to the Independent National Electoral Commission in Abuja.

Chairman of the group, Comrade Martins Oderowho, in a signed statement, said some corrupt INEC officials in Abuja and Asaba are already working in one accord to give the Election Tribunal sitting in Delta state false information about the date of submission of APC National Assembly, Governorship and State House of Assembly candidates’ names to INEC in order to give credence to their candidacy. “Whereas Form 48 was duly served on the Independent National Electoral Commission and the All Progressives Congress for going against the court order”, he noted.

“We want to let the world know that the Certified True Copies, photographs and videos of their form submission ceremony and dates are everywhere in Nigeria and they will soon be committed to prison for disobedience of court orders and deliberate attempt to temper with documented evidence. That’s why the court of Appeal sitting in Benin on Friday 29th March, 2019 struck out the application for joinder filed by Senator Ovie Omo-Agege and Rev. Francis Waive for lack of merit. Also on Monday 15th April, the same Court of Appeal sitting in Benin, Edo State struck a joinder appeal filed by Chief Great Ovedje Ogboru, challenging the Federal High Court judgment of March 18, 2019”, he added.

The group reiterated in the statement that all political parties’ candidates forms were displayed in all INEC offices across the 25 Local Government Areas of Delta state and photocopies are everywhere because some persons took pictures of the displayed copies and even detached some of the copies home. “So almost every politician and members of the public in Delta state are in possession of the submitted forms bearing dates of submission and INEC stamps”, said Oderowho.