Senator Dino
Melaye, representing Kogi West Senatorial district in the National Assembly
says the signatures allegedly collected to influence his recall and forwarded
to INEC were forged.
Addressing
newsmen on Sunday in Lokoja, Melaye who said investigations had revealed that
even the dead signed the recall across the seven area councils of the
senatorial district, described the process as fraudulent.
Speaking
through one of his legislative aides, Malam Abubakar Sadiq, the embattled
senator said names and signatures of dead constituents were on the list.
According to
him, the name of a former governorship aspirant of the All Progressive Congress
(APC) in the state, late Chief Rotimi Obadofin precisely from Iya-Gbede axis
was on the list.
“Let me also
sound authoritative that here in Lokoja Local Government Council, several
others whose names and signatures appeared on the list of the signatories to
this failed exercise were identified and known to us as being dead long before
now.
“Such people
like late Abdullahi Abubakar, his immediate younger sister late Halima Lawal
Abubakar and Ibrahim Adama of Unit Code 021, Adankolo Ring Road in Ward ‘A’,
Lokoja Local Government Council.
Also one
late Salihu Black of Gegu-Beki town, Kogi Local Government Council who until
his death was a biology teacher in Government Secondary School, Koton-Karfe,
also appended his signature on the recall list.
“This recall
exercise was hatched in Kogi Government House due to the manner in which
Senator Dino Melaye consistently challenges and engages the government over
non-payment of workers’ salaries and pensioners for over 15 months; and also
the constant closure of tertiary institutions,” he stated.
Senator
Melaye also alleged that they claimed to have gotten over 188,000 signatories
of the electorate in Kogi West when the total vote cast, both valid and
rejected, in the last senatorial election of 2015, was merely 111, 000 for all
the candidates that participated.
In a swift
reaction, Governor Yahaya Bello of Kogi said Senator Dino Melaye should stop
worrying about INEC.
Bello, who
spoke through his Chief Press Secretary, Mrs. Petra Onyegbule, said facts about
the constituents were with INEC which had the responsibility of verifying the
signatures.
“There is
nothing for the distinguished senator to be worried about. INEC has set July 3,
for the public verification of signatures and the date is around the corner;
there is no point burning their energies all over the place”, Onyegbule said.
On the
alleged collation of signatures in Government House, the spokesperson said it
was absolutely false as no single signature was collated in Government House.
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