Presidential candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN), Oby Ezekwesili, and former governor of Ekiti State, Ayo Fayose, have criticised the appointment of Amina Zakari as the chairperson of the INEC Committee on National Collation Centre.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has also rejected her appointment, claiming that she is President Muhammadu Buhari’s niece.
Mrs Ezekwesili said that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had bowed to Mr Buhari’s wish.
“How else can one describe this repugnant action of placing the President’s niece, Mrs Amina Zakari, at the head of collation of election results?
“The President and INEC chairman should know that this extremely repugnant and provocative act of political corruption that seeks to undermine our democracy and destabilise the country shall be resisted by all patriotic Nigerians,” Ezekwesili said.
INEC had on Thursday inaugurated ad hoc committees on Electoral Logistics and the National Collation Centre.
Mr Fayose chided INEC saying that a son of Buhari should have been appointed as INEC chairman.
“Instead of INEC appointing Amina Zakari, a blood relation (niece) of President Buhari, as the chairperson of INEC Advisory Committee and Presidential Election Collation Centre Committee, why not just appoint one of the President’s children as INEC chairman?” Fayose wrote in part on Twitter.
The PDP, on its part, said that Zakari’s appointment had set the stage for a political crisis.
In a press conference in Abuja by its spokesperson, Kola Ologbondiyan, on Thursday, the party said such appointment would assist Buhari, the APC and INEC to rig the presidential election.
The PDP spokesman urged the United Nations and other global democratic institutions to take copious note of “noxious appointment by the INEC chairman.”
But INEC spokesperson, Rotimi Oyekanmi, assured that the general elections would be credible.
