Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has said that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate in the February 23 election, Atiku Abubakar, are parading fake results which they claim they got from the commission’s internet server.
INEC had declared Muhammadu Buhari of All Progressives Congress (APC) winner of the election after it said Buhari polled 15, 191, 847 votes to defeat his closest rival, Atiku, whom it said polled 11, 262, 978 votes.
But Atiku and PDP said the original figures on the commission’s server showed he (Atiku) got a total of 18, 356, 732 votes to defeat Buhari whom they said scored 16, 741, 430 votes.
They said the results were the total votes scored by the candidates in 35 states and the Federal Capital Territory Abuja, as there was “no report on sever” about the results from Rivers State as of February 25, 2019.
In reply to a petition filed before the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal by the PDP and Atiku, INEC through its lead counsel, Yunus Usman, said results of the poll were never transmitted or collated electronically.
INEC backed up its reply to the petition with a statement on oath by its Director of Information and Communications Technology, Chidi Nwafor.
“That the lawful and recognised computation of results is manually done using Electoral Form EC8 series and not the table pleaded by the petitioners given that the said table is not the result collated and declared by the 1st respondent,” Mr Nwafor said in part.
