West News Wire: The European Union Electoral Observer Mission (EU-EOM)’s assessment of the 2023 general elections has drawn “strongest” resistance from the Nigerian presidency, who referred to it as a “jaundiced report” based on unsubstantiated bias and assertions.
The government referred to the final EU-EOM report as “the product of a poorly done desk job that relied heavily on few instances of skirmishes in less than 1000 polling units out of over 176,000 where Nigerians voted on election day,” in a statement released on Sunday.
After winning the presidential elections in February, Bola Ahmed Tinubu was inaugurated as president in the latter part of May.
At a press conference last week in Abuja, the EU-EOM’s chief observer, Barry Andrews, said the West African country’s February presidential elections were marred by problems that undermined public trust in the electoral process. He proposed reforms that would increase transparency and accountability.
Speaking to news reporters, the spokesperson of the Independent Nigerian Electoral Commission (INEC), Festus Okoye, insisted that the polls had been conducted in a credible manner and that the results reflected the “genuine preferences” of the voters.
He questioned the EU team’s report’s veracity, pointing out that the organisation was unable to send more than 40 observers to the 36 states.
He asserted that the report is not “based on actual facts on the ground” and that “40 observers cannot carry 176,000 in 36 states of the federation.”
Abuja locals also disputed the results, insisting that the polling was conducted in a “free and fair” manner.
“This election was the most legitimate one in our nation’s history. Because the election didn’t turn out the way they wanted, the EU claims it wasn’t transparent, a local told news reporters.
Meanwhile, the Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja, where Tinubu’s victory is being challenged by two of his main opponents, admitted in evidence on Monday the final report of the EU-EOM on the conduct of the poll.
