September 15, (THEWILL) – Nigerian opposition parties under the aegis of the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP), have alleged massive voter registration fraud and a plot to sack the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), professor Mahmood Yakubu.
The CUPP also alleged of a plot to use secret court action to stop the use of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machine in the 2023 general elections.
Addressing a world conference in Abuja, on Wednesday, Spokesperson for the Coalition, Ikenga Imo Ugochinyere, said its team uncovered a suit filed on August 24 at the Owerri Federal High Court, directed to stop the use of BVAS machine in next year elections.
The CUPP displayed extracts of the national voter register which it claimed were part of at least 10 million fake registrations done by one of the political parties. But it did not disclose the name of the political party.
According to the coalition, the names were sourced from both within and outside Nigeria including some African countries, including Ghana, Cameroon, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Togo, Guinea, and The Gambia, as well as countries outside Africa – Jamaica, Brazil and New Zealand.
The opposition parties said they have evidence of several registrations which were captured from passport photographs and other photos.
“Significant among the discoveries in the register is the fact that the majority of the foreign names were all born in 1983, without their photographs showing if they were old or young. Many people were also shown to have been born between 1900 and 1914, yet their photographs were those of young people. Equally, many male photos had their gender written as female and vice versa”, it alleged.
The coalition further alleged that INEC chairman, “Prof Mahmood Yakubu, is under pressure for the commission to announce a change to the Commission’s hard stands on the compulsory use of the BVAS machine for accreditation or get sacked as Chairman of the Commission.
“The intelligence the CUPP intercepted which has led to the discovery of the suit filed seeking to nullify the BVAS and exposure of the massive compromise in the voters’ register cannot now be wrong that the third leg of the plot is to sack the National Chairman through a suspension, as the plotters know they cannot get the required numbers from the National Assembly for an outright sack”, the coalition alleged
The CUPP, therefore, called on international partners, local and international observer groups, civil society and the general public to help it and protect democracy, as the success of any of these plots will erode the integrity and credibility of the electoral process and deny Nigerians the sovereign right to freely choose their leaders.
About the Author
