The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Returning Officer in Abia State, Prof. Nnenna Oti, has revealed that she was offered financial incentives and threats to manipulate the governorship elections.
CorrectNG reported last Wednesday that the declaration of Dr Alex Otti as governor-elect was made at the resumption of the final collation of governorship election results in Umuahia, the Abia State capital over 48 hours after INEC suspended the exercise.
He scored 175,467, to defeat the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Okey Ahiwe and Enyinnaya Nwafor of the Young Peoples Party (YPP), his closes contestants.
Ahiwe polled 88,529 while Nwafor got 28,972. The LP candidate also won 10 of the 17 local government areas in the state, PDP got six while the YPP got one.
Before the announcement, Nnennaya-Oti, who is the Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, said she will do the right of the people and protect democratic values.
Oti, who is also the Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology Owerri, said that before the final declaration of the result, she was promised huge monetary inducement to change the will and mandate of the people of Abia but that she remained resolute in the face of heavy intimidation and threats.
She made the revelation on Tuesday, March 29 while being welcomed by the management, staff and students of the university.
Her words; “As an electoral officer, I have never in my life participated in any election, but duty came calling, I made my enquiries from Abuja.
“If I perish, I perish, they came with their threats, they came with their money, they came with their intimidation.
“I didn’t start today; I stand here before God, Jesus Christ. I have never defrauded anyone, all l I did was to declare the riot act as follows: Under me, votes must count. Under me, the people’s mandate will be upheld because I, Professor Nnnena Oti, can never do evil.”
