ELECTION TRIBUNAL: OSUN AC ACCUSES OYINLOLA OF BUYING TIME

Election tribunal: Osun AC accuses Oyinlola of buying time

From AKEEB ALARAPE, Osogbo
Wednesday, March 10, 2010


Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola

Osun State chapter of the Action Congress (AC) has raised alarm over plan to unduly prolong the sitting of Election Retrial Tribunal in the state. Almost three years after the governorship election in the state, both AC governorship candidate, Engr. Rauf Aregbesola and the declared winner of the election, Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola, are still in legal tango for the third time on who won the election.

In a statement signed yesterday by the AC Director of Research and Strategy, Hon. Sunday Akere, the party described the recent decision of counsel to Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola to call an expert to verify INEC materials for the 2007 elections as a ploy to buy more time and prolong the sitting of the tribunal.

'We no longer have any doubt in our mind of the deliberate and mindless conscious efforts of the PDP to prolong the life of the retrial tribunal in view of the Oyinlola/PDP attitude since the tribunal began sitting close to one year now.

'It has been very obvious to all discerning minds, from the beginning, that the Oyinlola/PDP ordinarily wanted the sitting of the tribunal stalled since they know that the outcome was sure not going to be in their favour in view of the overwhelming and weighty evidences presented by our party.

'We bring to the fore the fact that the Oyinlola/PDP are using some of its cohorts, put up spirited efforts to stall commencement of the trial with a frivolous application, accusing our candidate of forging the police final security report, to the Federal High Court which it said should be sorted out before the tribunal will start sitting,' the statement read in part.

AC said it was particularly 'irked' by the refusal of the Oyinlola/PDP legal team to release to 'our legal team the report of their so-called expert within the stipulated 48 hours mandated by the tribunal at its sitting on Wednesday, March 3.'

'And today which is close to another 48 hours after the lapsing of the mandatory period, the PDP still insists on not making the report available for our legal team's perusal.

'We want the tribunal to know and be aware of the deliberate effort and attempt by the Oyinlola/PDP to thwart the tribunal's efforts at unraveling the true winner of the 2007 governorship election and install the genuine holder of the people's mandate', the statement added.

The party urged members of the panel to resist all 'attempts to frustrate them through unnecessary delays,' saying that the PDP 'knows it doesn't have any report to present and will prefer to make the sitting of the tribunal inconclusive.'