Director of media and publicity for the Presidential Campaign Organisation of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Femi Fani-Kayode has defended some footage of a meeting involving some PDP leaders in the southwest zone which purportedly reflected attempts to rig the Ekiti governorship election, describing it as both petty and despicable.
The leaders involved in what has now been termed “Ekitigate” include Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti state, Senator Musiliu Obanikoro of Lagos state, Minister Jelili Adesiyan of Osun state and Senator Iyiola Omisore of Osun state.
At a news conference today in Abuja, Fani-Kayode said that he has listened to the audio clip and he found out that the discussion that took place in it did not make any mention of any form of rigging in the Ekiti state governorship election and neither did it contain any evidence of any conspiracy to rig.
“Rather than attempting to orchestrate rigging, what the audio clip clearly reveals was Governor Fayose expressing concerns that a Military commander was not acting on information about illegal movement of weapons into certain parts of the state. The Governor and others were apparently worried that safety of the voters and INEC officials could be compromised if security measures were not strictly enforced.”
He challenged opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) to do a critical content analysis of the discussions in the audio clip and that it would find out that the claims of rigging against Governor Fayose and all the others that were mentioned cannot be sustained.
“Sadly the same cannot be said about the electoral perfidy which the APC
perpetrated in the Osun state
governorship elections. During the course of those elections, some of their agents gathered in secret locations where they thumb-printed ballot papers in favor of their governorship candidate, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola.” [myad]
