PDP candidate, family disenfranchised

Says, ‘I’ll win in spite of all odds’
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Comrade Tony Nwoye and family, including his father were yesterday disenfranchised by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), as their names were missing in the voters’ register at his Ofia Nta Ward I, Nsugbe in Anambra East Local Government.
Nwoye who had earlier visited the polling unit at 8am for accreditation and stayed for over one hour without seeing the electoral officers, left and returned hours later only to be told that his name was not there and that they would do something about it.
But when at about 3pm he returned and went through the register himself he was shocked that out of about 403 persons that were registered and voted there in 2011 during the National Assembly election, which he contested and was declared elect by the Court of Appeal, only about 94 names were in the register INEC brought yesterday for the election.
Addressing newsmen after going through the register, Nwoye said it was unfortunate that the incumbent government had continued to connive with INEC to rig governorship elections in the state by ensuring that they disenfranchise people at the opponents’ strongholds, noting that was the same pattern used to rig in Governor Obi in 2010.
He said, “I am a little bit disappointed, I was here as early as 8am to get accredited. I didn’t see anybody. I went around the polling booths in my town, most of the polling booths I went to I saw crowds, some 800, some over a thousand people. They came out in thousands to be accredited, they did not see any INEC officials and materials. It took the intervention of the federal INEC Commissioner, Amb. Lawrence Nwurukwu for them to come to our polling booths between 10.30 and 11 am, yet when I came they weren’t ready and I had to go and come back again.
“Now that I came I did not see my name, my father who registered here did not see his name, my uncle, my twin brother, and others, most of us did not see our names. They said I should go. They will sort it out. I came back again they had not sorted it out. It is shocking. I was elected in the same place, I voted here in 2011and now that register that has more than 450 close to 500 registered voters does not have up to 100 registered voters now. What happened? INEC went and removed them overnight, it is not right.
“This is the only election that is being conducted today in the whole country today, so in 2015 when Jega will be conducting election simultaneously in the whole country, how can he cope? And most importantly we got report in Ogidi, Obosi and even in Agulu where Governor Obi comes from that the governor hijacked materials and used security to chase people away, the transitional chairman under Mr. Peter Obi government has chased people away, using police to write result, so it is not good.
“If we should lose, we want to be bad losers not for them to rig, but upon the whole irregularities, upon the whole malpractices, we are still confident that we are going to still win because the youths of Anambra are resisting them everywhere. They are resisting Peter Obi and INEC everywhere. We strongly believe that there is a strong connivance between INEC and Obi, even in Dr. Ngige’s town they don’t want people to vote just as they don’t want people to vote in my town.
Obosi where my wife comes from has more than 57,000 registered voters. Up till now they have not allowed them to vote. It’s not good for democracy.”
On his next line of action he said, “We are still expecting result and as the results are coming by we will know the direction to follow but upon all the malpractices we are still confident that we are going to win.”