The third-placed party in the 2023 Presidential Election, Labour Party (LP) has demanded for the dismissal and prosecution of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Mahmood Yakubu, over the alleged poor conduct of the February 25 polls.

Akin Osuntokun, Director General of the LP Presidential Campaign Council, made the announcement during a news conference at the party’s campaign headquarters in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital.

Among other things, Mr. Osuntokun demanded that a forensic financial examination be done on all expenditures and donations received by the electoral commission prior to, during, and after the elections.

This is in addition to the N300 billion appropriated from the national budget and other funds and materials obtained from international donor organizations, he said.

“We demand unequivocally, the immediate dismissal from Office and prosecution of Prof Mahmud Yakubu and the commencement of forensic financial investigation into the expenditure of budgeted disbursements and donors’ funds received by INEC,” he said.

In response to the ongoing court action, Mr Osuntokun stated that the evidence provided by both the PDP and the LP verified their initial suspicions that the election was tainted by anomalies.

While demanding that the INEC National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, and other top administrative and field officials be punished for their alleged complicity, he also warned against any further intimidation of the European Union and other election observers over their reports on the poll, Premium Times reports.

The Labour Party and the Obi-Datti Presidential Campaign Organisation condemn vehemently, the negative and jaundiced responses on the EU Report and other Election Observers’ reports, by the spokesperson of APC administration and other ill-informed persons, which are totally in discord, with the mood of the nation, at this time, and which also, present an embarrassing contrast, to their selective celebration of the 2019 Election reports, from these same Observer groups,” he said.

“It is now only logical, bolstered by the final Observer Group reports, that the International Community take immediate and appropriate punitive action against Prof Mahmud Yakubu, Barrister Festus Okoye, and other top administrative and field staff of INEC, directly complicit, in the desecration of these elections.”

“We advise those who have deployed hired ‘protesters’ to the offices of the EU, in respect of their election report, to desist from any further wastage of public funds, as the objective of intimidation is without basis, and has failed, from the beginning – because indeed, the irregularities in the election, were so excessively glaring, with bitter personal and reported experiences, by the overwhelming majority of Nigerians.”

“At this juncture, there is no doubt that Nigerians and the International Community expect the judiciary, to critically examine the evidence, the law, and the processes of these flawed elections, in arriving at a legally correct, and overwhelmingly knowledgeable verdict,” Mr Osuntokun concluded.