PDP labels ex-Cross River REC, Briyia, an APC mole who helped rig 2019 polls for Buhari

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused the Professor Mahmood Yakubu-led Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of using its staff, who are members of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), to allegedly rig the 2019 election in favour of President Muhammadu Buhari.

The party argued that the manifestation of Frankland Briyia, the former Cross River State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), as an All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship aspirant in Bayelsa State while still in office, was a direct confirmation that the “APC used its members to write figures for Buhari in the February Presidential election.”

The PDP made this allegation in a statement by its spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan on Sunday, adding that Briyia’s governorship ambition on the platform of the APC, which he allegedly announced while still in the confines of his office as REC, “amply exposed INEC as a partisan electoral umpire under the watch of Professor Yakubu.”

The opposition party further argued that the fact that President Buhari failed to sanction Briyia, even after he “brazenly announced his ambition right in INEC facility betrays APC’s embedded interests in the commission, which manifested in the manipulation of processes related to the Presidential elections.”

The party urged Nigerians to note that INEC had in a recent statement denied receiving any resignation letter from Briyia at the time he announced his governorship ambition.

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“Our party, therefore, calls on President Buhari to come out clean on the real reason he failed to sanction the Cross River REC in line with the law.

“The PDP also urges Mr. President to speak out on allegations in the public space that his Presidency failed to sanction Mr. Briyia because of the role he allegedly played in favour of the APC in the Presidential election,” the party added.

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