I DEFEATED NGIGE WITHOUT A SINGLE THUG AND I WILL BEAT HIM AGAIN ANY DAY -AKUNYILI

Former Minister of information and Communication, Prof. Dora Akunyili, has sensationally revealed what transpired in the inconclusive Anambra Central Senatorial District election on April 9, which she contested. In an interview, in her Abuja residence, Akunyili dismisses the bribery allegation made by the former returning officer in the election.

She told Saturday Sun that there was more to the allegation than the controversial returning officer is willing to admit. She also explained why his major opponent in the poll, Dr. Chris Ngige, is not comfortable with the idea of a run-off.

You have been in the trenches, sort of, since after the inconclusive Anambra Central Senatorial election. How has it been?

When I went to run for the election and therefore serve my people as senator for Anambra Central District, I knew that the terrain would be rough. I didn't, however, know that it would be totally crazy. But because of my determination to go through the process, irrespective of the emotional and physical stress involved, I continued to the end. Campaigns were tedious. Most of the time, we started by 5.30pm, especially on Sundays, till midnight. But God gave me the strength to go through it, to the end. We had election, and during the election, I couldn't believe what I saw, the level of desperation of politicians; the issue of I-must-win attitude, has actually caused most of the things that happened.

Could you explain what you mean by desperation of politicians as per the contest for the Anambra Central Senatorial seat?

Politicians always trigger fracas in the areas of strength of their opponent, and when they don't succeed in destabilising a polling unit, they send thugs to snatch result sheets, so that result sheets would not get to collation centres. They do one thing or the other. In fact, in some instances, ballot boxes were totally carted away. In one of the instances, a ballot box was snatched and carried to a private home, in the full glare of the public. It was not hidden because everybody knows the man that carried it to a private residence. It's as bad as that; it's impunity. But at the end, we just felt that no matter what happened, the wish of the people would prevail.

The election in which you were a candidate has been dogged by controversy. Could you tell us what actually happened?

On Sunday, the former returning officer kept telling every person that he had been threatened that if he ever announced Prof. Akunyili a winner, he would be in trouble. He was rattled. But little did I know that the man that was telling people that he was being threatened was no longer the returning officer. The first retuning officer for Anambra Central was Prof. Godwin Onu. But by 10am on Saturday, Prof. Godwin Onu, either had not reported or had declined the assignment. Because Prof. Onu did not take up the job, the REC quickly appointed Dr. Alex Anene. Dr. Anene even admitted on television that he had no training for the job.

Midway, people believed that he must have abducted or gone into hiding. When he absconded, the REC appointed a third returning officer, and that was Prof. Charles Esimone. Prof Charles Esimone was the returning officer for Idemili North Local Government Area. It was when he returned the result for Idemili North that the REC appointed him to work as returning officer for Anambra Central. Just as he quickly employed Alex Anene, he also quickly employed Charles Esimone, and the next day, that was on Monday, the results were announced, and we were told that some of the places were inconclusive, for many reasons.

For instance, in Nimo 1 and 3, the result sheets did not get to the collation centre, and these are my areas of strength. There were cases of result sheets being snatched en route to collation centre. Thugs were shooting; there was a lot of shooting. But I feel comfortable each time I remind myself that I never had one thug, and I will never have any. In the announcement by Esimone, in the company with the REC, he said that the election was inconclusive in some areas, although I was leading by almost 700. This was around 10am.

We were given the areas for rerun, and we had to abide by the directive given by INEC. But at about 10.30 to 11pm the same night, we started getting phone calls that Dr. Ngige was declared winner by Dr. Alex Anene. At first, it was like a joke, and we said, where? They said it was in a hotel in Awka. And no INEC person was present in that hotel, not even one person. Only Ngige's supporters were there, because from the hotel, where they declared him, they went to his second hotel - Old English Hotel -where they interviewed him close to midnight.

And by morning, we started seeing all television and radio stations announcing Ngige as winner. Then when I called Radio Nigeria and asked what was going. What kind of lawlessness is this? How can Radio Nigeria be announcing the result of an election that is inconclusive, a result declared in a hotel room at night by a former returning officer who was no longer the returning officer? And by law returning officers are supposed to collate the result in the INEC office and the results had not even all come in by the time he absconded, like Idemili North had not come in.

Radio Nigeria now quickly investigated and I was told that one Adaora in Abuja directed the correspondent in Awka to go and cover it that night and give her the report. The boy covered the event and gave her the report and in the report he duly said it was done in a hotel and there was no INEC official. The lady left all these details out and only said Ngige was declared winner by INEC. So, Radio Nigeria had to retract the story because they saw the illegality in the process and Adaora was sanctioned, I learnt.

What was your reaction?
Naturally, I was rattled. I was unhappy. I felt robbed because even though it cannot stand because it doesn't make sense, it still rubs off when your opponent is claiming victory in an inconclusive election. It can even deceive the electorate. And psychologically it can deal a blow on people, and I believe they knew what they were doing. It was clear in their heads, because Dr. Ngige knows that if we run this election 10 times he will not win, and the run-off, he will not win. It is getting clearer by the day. In Channels Television interview this night (Wednesday), he was saying that he was not ready to go for rerun. But he said he believed he won. If he won, he should be ready for run-off any day any time. I am ready, even tomorrow, I will find a way to make phone calls and make sure the agents are around, and we go to the run-off.

It's very embarrassing, not just to me, but also to this country because I feel that when you go on the Internet and say election result of a senatorial zone in Nigeria was announced in a hotel, it's a disgrace to the country. It doesn't make us look good; it makes nonsense of our rebranding, that we cannot even do the right thing in a simple election of vote, count and collate. As far as I am concerned, it is simple, it is do-or-die politicians, the I-must-win politicians that are creating the crisis because they don't want to face election, because they are used to election rigging; they have been used to writing results, so when it comes to proper elections, they are confused.

They don't want to face it; they want it to be rigged. But thank God for Prof. (Attahiru) Jega, this particular election is very difficult to be rigged because from polling booth level, people have results, ward level, local government, state, everybody has result. It is even impossible to mutilate. What are you going to mutilate? Are you going to mutilate in every party schedule? It is impossible. So, I feel very comfortable with the process, but unfortunately, the process was not completed.

Anene alleged that some elements in your party wanted to compromise him. What really happened?

Coming to the allegations of bribery, that one has hurt me more than all the confusion, because I have built my integrity almost at the risk of my life. I will never be party to any bribery discussion. First of all, he said that APGA wanted to bribe him, that government agents wanted to compromise him. Mind you, he never mentioned my name, or linked me with bribery. He said that they wanted to give him N10 million, a jeep, a house and scholarship to all his children.

When I heard this, I said this man, did they say he has a PhD? He should be smarter because some lies when they are prepared in a smart way can convince. How do you convince people that anybody can offer you all these? Is it Gov. Peter Obi that everybody knows that his hand is tight? Governor Obi cannot give anybody that kind of thing. People accuse him of having aradite hand, but I always say he is prudent with resources. I know that my governor cannot give him a house; you can't give what you don't have. If you go to Agulu (where Peter Obi comes from), he is still living in a house built by his own mother.

When you ask him, why can't you build your own house, he says this flat is enough for me. So, how can somebody living in his mother's house build a house for another? Is it a ready-made house? And how can somebody keep an agreement of training your children for the future?

And this brings me to another point: how INEC recruits ad-hoc staff, because that is another bomb waiting to explode. The kind of human beings that are working as ad-hoc staff, some of them are not mentally together. Then when you come to the issue of money, inducement, I want to tell you something; some people were actually looking for money from everybody. But when they came to me, they hit the wall.

Was there any discussion between you and the said returning officer?

Erike, one of my key supporters, called me. I was in company with some people. He said they wanted him to tell me to provide security and other 'considerations,' so that they would declare me winner. I was so angry with Erike because I have worked all my life for integrity, and I have worked hard for my election, I campaigned very hard, people are supporting me, and I am winning.

Even if I am not winning, I will not negotiate with anybody. I said so much to him, and he was so rattled. I told him, listen, Erike, if anything happened to my result, I will hold you responsible because I don't need help. Let them announce our results, I am not discussing with anybody. So, he got angry because of the way I shouted at him. He felt very unhappy and left for Lagos.

Were there some police officers and security personnel at the collation centre? If there were, what did they do?

The way the policemen were behaving that day, it's something I can't explain. They were all looking helpless, all.

How? They were not armed or what?
They had guns, but the thugs looked fiercer than them; the thugs were too many; they overwhelmed them. That was on Sunday. We were waiting for the result to be announced. The result from Idemili North had not arrived.

Why did the result from Idemili North delay? Is the terrain so difficult that its result could not arrive when other arrived?

They don't have rivers or any difficult terrain, but they did a lot of rigging there. In fact, in Alor, the rigging was so bad that party agents could not sign the result; it can be checked out. But we let it to go; no problem because no matter how much you rig, it is difficult to rig out a popular candidate, except if the rigging gets out of hand. There was so much rigging in Alor that my people refused to sign, and no other party agent signed.

Now that the man had alleged attempts to compromise him, what next do you do?

He never said I offered him bribe. He said government agents and APGA officials. The man did not have the courage to call me, because the people he was sending as middlemen must have said, listen, 'Dora Akunyili? Not me, I don't want to be arrested.' He did not even have the courage to say Dora Akunyili wanted to compromise him; listen carefully, he never said so.

Are you satisfied with the way INEC has responded to the matter?

Prof. Jega is a man we all respect in this country; he has earned that respect. I believe that his judgment is correct, because he wants to be very careful before he comes out with a statement. If he came out today with a statement declaring me winner, people will say did you look at this thing properly? Because there are only two scenarios: declaring me winner or having a re-run in those few places.

For me, re-run 10 times, I am ready; if he declares me winner, I will be happy. If he says there will be rerun, no problem. But the one I find criminal is the former returning officer who had absconded going to a hotel, at the dead of the night, to announce results with only Ngige's supporters; no INEC presence. If he had requested for security, I believe that the REC would have provided him with security. REC has never said this man asked me to provide him with security. I thank God that he has no boldness to say Dora Akunyili offered him bribe.

But a number of people from your senatorial zone have been congratulating Ngige and telling INEC to uphold the 'election' of Ngige. How do you react to this?

I am an information person. It's very easy. If I want to organise 20 groups to write press statements, I will do that. So, these people are all organised, and they keep calling me, 'can our group do this for you? Can our group organise this?'

I say organise nothing, don't organise anything for me. Election has been done, and we want to know the result; so these things are all arranged, and its Nigerian style. Let me tell you, they will organise more than 20 groups; just pay them and they will issue a statement in your favour. Look at the man that came on AIT; he called himself chairman of Anambra Forum for Good Governance, and yet he was one of Ngige's campaign directors.

And he came and was talking about the votes I got in my local government, Aniocha being over 25, 000. Blatant lies. Aniocha votes were even fewer than those Ngige got from Idemili North, a sister local government to his own. He comes from Idemili South. Aniocha votes (for APGA) were 22, 451, Idemili North votes (for Ngige) were 22, 569, and Aniocha has over 77, 000 registered voters. He was crying wolves over 22, 451 in my local government, but the 22, 569 in his neighbouring local government were okay.