Agboola Ajayi, the PDP’s candidate for the Ondo governorship, has cast his ballot at Apoi Ward II, Unit 004 in Kiribo, Ese Odo local government area.
Around 10:36 a.m., Agboola and his spouse arrived at the voting station, where they were given the opportunity to cast their ballots ahead of other people in line.
At around 10:45 a.m., the pair was allowed to cast their ballots and spoke with voters for a little while before driving away in his black Jeep.
Shortly after casting his ballot, Agboola spoke out against the way the exercise was conducted and said that there were serious anomalies in the current governorship election.
He charged that the security services and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had rigged the poll to benefit the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate.
Agboola asked INEC chairman Mahmood Yakubu to step down for overseeing the most crooked election in Nigerian history, claiming that preliminary reports from all 16 local government areas indicate the poll so far was far below the standard.
He claimed that the PDP chieftains’ stronghold was militarized to prevent people from exercising their right to vote, calling the exercise not just a fraud but also a coordinated attempt to destroy the democratic process.
“You must realize that we are heading toward anarchy in Nigeria if INEC is unable to successfully conduct elections in a single state,” he stated.
“Remember that we previously stated that we don’t trust Mrs. Oluwatoyin Babalola, the REC, because she is incapable of being fair. I have been receiving reports from all over the state, and I am one of the victims here in my unit. I want to state that this is intentional on the part of the REC and the INEC.”
“The system is compromised, and there are complaints all over the state about things like vote-buying, malfunctioning BVAS, and the machine being used as a rigging tool.” It is a very dishonorable exercise, and I believe that Nigerians should simply call on Professor Mahmood Yakubu, the chairman of INEC, to retire honorably if he is unable to perform his duties. This is unfortunate because the system is completely corrupted.
“Our electoral process was approaching international standards under Professor Attahiru Jega as INEC chairman, but Professor Yakubu has pulled us back. This is unfortunate, and Nigerians are not happy.”
“From my community here, it is peaceful but accused the military operatives deployment more men to his area and I would take it up with the brigade commander,” the PDP candidate stated in reference to the security situation. Voters cannot be intimidated by them.We are not at war, so how do you deploy seven or ten armed soldiers?
People were willing to cast ballots in spite of the intimidation because they were already fed up with the state and the nation.
“The system is not perfect, things are not working and it took more than 10 minutes before the BVAS could accredit me,” he said, expressing his dissatisfaction with the delay he had to endure before he could cast his ballot because of a BVAS problem.
A suspected vote-buyer in the Ondo gubernatorial election has been taken into custody by Department of State Services (DSS) agents.
According to reports, the guy was apprehended carrying two bags of cash that were thought to be used to entice people to cast ballots.
Around nine in the morning on election day, the suspect was seen on camera outside St. Stephen’s Primary School in Akure, Ondo State, at Ward 4, Polling Unit 007, according to the Nation.