Nigeria Content Online

The acting national
chairman of the Alliance for Democracy (AD), Okechukwu Obioha, has
accused the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of
maintaining a strong link with the party’s former national chairman,
Michael Koleoso, and three other officials, despite their defection to
the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN).

The other officials are the national secretary, treasurer, and Magaji Kwarianga, Tunji Adebiyi, and Musa Umar.

Mr. Obioha wrote
the chairman of the electoral body, Attahiru Jega, and the police
informing them that the officials had since left the party, but were
still holding on to its sensitive documents.

The letter had
said, “We request and appreciate with utmost importance and
expectations that the INEC you now head, will do the legal and right
thing by approving what we have done in the given circumstance.

“Please direct
Chief Michael Koleoso, the former chairman, and the other trio named
above, to hand over every document and property of Alliance for
Democracy in their possession in the interest of true democratic
practice you have come to bequeath us and for the peace and unity of
this country,” the letter said.

However, Mr. Obioha
told our correspondent in a telephone interview yesterday that several
months after he personally submitted the letter to INEC, it is yet to
act on it. He alleged that the commission still deals with the former
officials in violation of the rules guiding party monitoring.

“INEC has not
replied us. The reply is long overdue. INEC is no longer what they used
to be. I thought they should be able to honour what we have done, but I
am surprise they still have something to do with our former officials,”
Mr. Obioha said.

He explained that
the tenure of Mr. Koleoso and the other officials had expired, but that
they have been coercing members of AD to accept a proposal to merge it
with the ACN.

He added that
following the proposal, a convention was held which turned out to be a
charade, adding that this resulted to his appointment by the national
executive committee (NEC) as acting national chairman of the party,
since Mr. Koleoso and the others had indicated their intention to move
to the ACN.

The acting national
chairman also alleged that the affected officials have refused to
return the documents of the party since then, and that the commission
has refused to prevail on them to do so.

Neither Mr. Koleoso nor the other former officials could be reached for comments.

But INEC said it will attend to the letter and other similar petitions in due course after thorough investigations.

“All petitions to INEC will be responded to in due course after
thorough investigations of the issues involved,” Kayode Idowu, media
aide to Mr. Jega, told NEXT yesterday.