By AfrikTimes | Osogbo
With just weeks to go before Osun State picks its next governor, the campaign organization backing incumbent Ademola Adeleke has thrown down a challenge to the Independent National Electoral Commission to avoid repeating the mistakes of recent off-cycle polls.
The Imole Campaign Council, fronting Adeleke’s re-election bid, used a Monday briefing in Osogbo to catalogue a string of alleged irregularities from earlier elections in Ogun, Oyo, Jigawa and Ekiti — irregularities its Director-General, Lere Oyewumi, says INEC cannot afford to let recur on August 15.
According to Oyewumi, PVCs reportedly ended up in the hands of suspected vote-buying agents in those states just before polling began. He also pointed to shortages of ballot papers and other essential materials, and claimed that ballots already marked in someone’s favour circulated during this year’s Ekiti governorship contest.
Technical glitches with the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, he said, dogged both the Ekiti poll and the FCT Area Council elections. And in a separate claim, Oyewumi alleged that parties which never even fielded candidates in the Anambra, Ekiti and FCT elections somehow turned up listed on ballot papers and result sheets.
Turning to the race closer to home, Oyewumi said the campaign has picked up on chatter, attributed to unnamed APC figures in the state, about BVAS machines allegedly being preloaded ahead of the vote. He didn’t mince words about what that would mean if true, declaring it a system rigged before a single voter shows up rather than one that reflects actual turnout.
He paired that with a warning over the newly begun PVC distribution exercise. The council wants the process fully transparent, insists collection by proxy should not be allowed, and cautioned that any attempt to deny Osun residents their cards would not go unchallenged.
Oyewumi was careful to frame the grievances as constructive rather than combative, saying the goal is a cleaner process, not a dented reputation for the commission. He described Osun voters as peaceful and politically engaged, and said they deserve nothing less than a credible, transparent outcome that mirrors how they actually voted. His closing ask: that INEC take the concerns seriously and fix what needs fixing before election day.
Osun heads to the polls on Saturday, August 15, with fourteen parties on the ballot. Three names are drawing the most attention, and these are; Adeleke defending his seat under the Accord banner, the APC’s Bola Oyebamiji, and Dr Najeem Salaam of the African Democratic Congress.
