SENATORIAL POLL: ANDY UBA IS PDP CANDIDATE -INEC

Andy Uba
The controversy raging on the issue of the Peoples Democratic Party(PDP) fielding two candidates for the rerun of the Anambra South senatorial election has been laid to rest with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declaring that it recognizes Senator Andy Uba as the lawful candidate.

The Court of Appeal had ordered that fresh election should be conducted in the Anambra South senatorial zone following a petition by the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) candidate Chuma Nzeribe, alleging some anomalies in the last election, won by Senator Uba.

In a statement issued by INEC on Friday, the body said there should be no controversy over who the authentic candidate of the PDP was since they were just organizing a rerun of an election, which the Court of Appeal ordered should be re-conducted based on a petition by one of the aggrieved candidates in the last election.INEC said it could not admit new candidates for a disputed election as the law was clear on this.

It, therefore, declared that based on the laid down rules, the candidate of the PDP remained Senator Andy Uba, who is contesting against Chuma Nzeribe of APGA and others who had earlier taken part in the last election.

The statement said INEC, as an unbiased umpire would always act within the tenets of the law, irrespective of the personalities or parties involved.

The Court of Appeal sitting in Enugu had ruled that the fresh election should be conducted within 90 days in line with the elections' guidelines.

With this, all is now set for the election scheduled to take place tomorrow.

Already, security has been beefed up with the police deploying special security to the state to ensure free and fair election.

INEC also assured that it had put all necessary logistics in place for a hitch free exercise.

Nzeribe had gone to the election tribunal to complain about irregularities in some wards in the last election.This resulted in the cancellation of the entire election by the special Tribunal. Senator Uba had also protested the decision to have fresh elections in all the wards, instead of those places in dispute.The special tribunal, however, threw out his appeal and ordered for this rerun.