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A member of the
Congress for Progressive Change, Aghanya Dennis, has asked the
Independent National Electoral Commission to not only restore the names
of candidates who won party primaries and were illegally substituted by
their own parties, but to also invite the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission to investigate the sources of the substitutions and
prosecute all those involved.

“Political parties
should bury their faces in shame rather than blame INEC for
substituting names of candidates for the forthcoming 2011 general
elections,” he said. “This issue is necessary to be made point blank
because some political parties are already blaming INEC for bringing
back names of candidates who originally won primaries but their names
were substituted with names of people who lost at the primaries.”

Mr. Aghanya claimed
that many candidates had discovered that the lists forwarded by many
political parties were filled with contradictions as names of many
candidates who won at the primaries were substituted with names of
candidates that lost at the primaries or did not even participate at
all.

He also alleged
that many of the names were substituted, “because they did not give
them money as demanded, they substituted names with those who played
ball as they demanded.”

The former party
spokesperson who has been at loggerheads with his party leadership over
the last conduct of its congress however called on the electoral
commission to “not only put back names of candidates who won the
primaries based on their supervision but to go further and invite the
EFCC to investigate the sources of such illegal substitutions and
prosecute all those involved.

“It will not be a waste of resources as no effort would be too much to sanitize our democracy and consolidate it.

Political parties must imbibe the culture of internal democracy to ensure that this democracy works,” he said.