Abuja (Sundiata Post): In a letter to senior security agencies, suspended Resident Electoral Commissioner Hudu Yunusa Ari claimed that Aisha Binani won the 2023 Adamawa gubernatorial election without proof.
In a lengthy missive received at the Force Headquarters on April 20, copied to the director-general of the State Security Service (SSS), National Security Adviser (NSA), and INEC chairman, Mr. Ari claimed that the two national commissioners, Baba Bila and Abdullahi Zuru, who had been tasked to assist him with the supplementary election on March 15, were secretly working with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
As Mrs. Ahmed was proclaimed the winner in the additional exercise, Mr. Yunusa Ari fled. The INEC chief made an off-the-cuff statement without evidence. He left the state aboard a chartered jet later that day and has not been seen since.
INEC headquarters in Abuja invalidated Mr. Yunusa Ari’s action, called him to Abuja, and urged the police and other security agencies to arrest him. The agency proclaimed PDP candidate Ahmadu Fintiri the winner. President Muhammadu Buhari ordered the immediate arrest of Mr. Yunusa Ari for the unlawful announcement, which caused countrywide worry.
Although Mr. Yunusa Ari wrote to federal authorities, it was unclear if security officials knew his location.
INEC spokesperson Festus Okoye told The Gazette that Mr. Yunusa Ari should turn himself in to the commission or police, who have a file on his duty-related offences.
Mr. Okoye told The Gazette Tuesday night that he should disclose and address electoral breaches and make his charges as part of a police probe.
Mr. Okoye stated, “The panel is not interested in his ‘fictional letters from hiding'”. “He should give the cops a story. He can also report to the commission, which will take him to the police.”
SSS spokesperson Peter Afunanya referred The Gazette to an April 16 press statement in which the secret police stated it was probing an attack “in which someone presumed to be its personnel was reportedly manhandled by some political miscreants in Adamawa State.”
Mr. Yunusa Ari’s claim that SSS agents were assaulted by Government House police and “thugs loyal to the PDP” was supported by the statement.
But Mr. Afunanya did not react when asked if the secret police had found Mr. Yunusa Ari’s hiding place since his previous testimony over a week ago.
On Tuesday, the police stated they got more instructions from INEC headquarters concerning Mr. Yunusa Ari’s offences and escalated the manhunt. On Tuesday night, the NSA did not respond to a request for comment.
A legal practitioner, Mr. Yunusa Ari, discovered that INEC officials met with Mr. Fintiri in Government House Yola at 8:31 p.m. on Friday, the night before the election, to complete preparations to replace the collation officers and modify the election results.
On election day, the state’s commissioner of police gave him the results of a conspiracy that revealed how certain politicians had paid Boko Haram militants to steal vote boxes and disrupt the voting, Mr. Ari claimed.
The same day, the police warned that the militants planned to assault local administrations to disrupt collation. In the four-page letter, Mr. Ari was encouraged to transfer collation from local government areas to INEC headquarters.
The electoral commissioner claimed he swiftly cooperated and ordered all ad hoc personnel to collate at the commission’s offices in Dougirei, Yola.
He said he didn’t realise that the two helping national commissioners “quietly and surreptitiously passed out contradicting counter directions” to the electoral officers, including that collation should be done in local government areas with new local government collation officials he wasn’t aware of.
Mr. Yunusa Ari denied any misconduct, saying, “This is without my knowledge or authorization as the Resident Electoral Commissioner as established by legislation establishing INEC and the Electoral Act.”
Afterwards, he discovered Messrs. Bila and Zuru discreetly tallied results at local governments using “self-appointed, unauthorised, and unlawful collation officers.”
When preparing for state collation, Mr. Ari was astonished to discover that his name had been eliminated and “replaced with that of the administrative secretary to take responsibility for collation.”
He questioned the national commissioners but received no response. They “claimed that I was nowhere to be located.”
He stated security agents from Government House Yola placed him under house arrest, and the police commissioner sent mobile policemen to rescue him.
“It needed the involvement of the commissioner of police, who deployed mobile cops to my residence, and when they heard a call was made to the CP, the policemen from Government House escaped in a white Toyota Hilux van,” Mr. Yunusa Ari said.
Mr. Yunusa Ari claimed he went to the collation centre where Messrs. Bila and Zuru were sleeping at 1:00 a.m. on April 16 to remind them he was still the state’s REC and that all stakeholders for the re-run poll should return by 11:00 a.m.
According to the electoral commissioner, “the results on the portal were different because the results on the INEC site were not signed by me.”
Mr. Yunusa Ari said he called a conference of security authorities, including the police commissioner, SSS, Civil Defence commandant, and others, to finish the supplemental elections and avoid lawlessness.
After collating the results, he pronounced Ms. Binani the Adamawa gubernatorial election winner.
“It was based on this that I collated all the polling unit results and proclaimed the victor of the election based on the greatest number of legitimate votes earned by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Aishatu Dahiru Ahmed Binani,” Mr. Ari stated in the letter.
He added: “The breakdown of the valid votes scored by the two leading candidates in the supplementary election using the results from the polling units as collated into all relevant Forms EC8B, C, D, and E, respectively, by properly and legally appointed and recognised collation officers and my humble self as Adamawa state Chief Collation Officer and Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC).”
Mr. Yunusa Ari stated that his pronouncement caused PDP thugs to attack the two other INEC commissioners for failing to change the poll results to favour the incumbent governor despite taking bribes from his team.
Mr. Ari added, “Therefore, shortly after the declaration, some PDP supporters assaulted one of the National Commissioners, Prof. Abdullahi Zuru, and the Returning Officer, Prof. Muhammad Mele, for failing to deliver Mr. Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri in the election after taking money from him.”
He further alleged that one SSS operative who knew about the national commissioners’ bribery was overpowered, disarmed, and taken to the Government House, where he was attacked by police and “thugs loyal to the PDP.”
“The result gathered by the two national commissioners is clouded in question, which is inadmissible and consequently illegal,” Mr. Ari said, citing the circumstances leading up to Mr. Fintiri’s supposed triumph.
Mr. Ari said his activities were legal under the Electoral Act of 2022.
“I want to definitely clarify that my activity is within the obligation bestowed on me and within the scope of legislation, specifically the Election Act 2022 as modified.”
Mr. Yunusa Ari confirmed his role as chief collation officer in the letter, but he did not claim the ability to proclaim a winner.
The governor’s spokesperson refuted the bribery charges. INEC did not address Mr. Yunusa Ari’s bribery claims against Messrs. Bila and Zuru.
According to The Gazette, at least seven governor’s aides were detained for attacking the SSS agent, an assistant director. As of Wednesday morning, it remained unclear if they had been freed.
