Members of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) in Cross Rivers States have raised over the distortion of their party logo on the ballot paper at the polling unit last Saturday.
According to them the discrepancies to the party logo made it difficult for voters to cast their votes properly.
Addressing the media on the matter, NNPP Cross Rivers gubernatorial candidate, Wilfred Bonse noted that the party’s logo was completely different – with the party’s logo which is a basket of fruits replaced by ‘a mixed coloured basket of what looked like one or two tubers of yam without the party’s acronym beneath it.’
“That’s a total fiasco, total fiasco. Even when some of our candidates and agents tried to capture and video it with their mobile phones as evidence, they were attacked. This is a very big gang up and conspiracy, if you like, against the NNPP. The other partis had their logos clearly stated. I struggled very hard to find ours and in mind that one is not supposed to start teaching people at the election grounds how to identify your party logo, the experience we had (on Saturday) was quite horrendous,” lamented Bonse.
Similarly, Cross River North Senatorial candidate, Carolyn Williams Okem added that the ballot papers for House of Representatives and Presidential elections had different logos.
“It (the logo) had stars on it, a complete contrast to our party’s authentic logo. So, a lot of our supporters and voters confused because they couldn’t recognize the party logo. It brought a lot of chaos and instability in the voting process,” said Okem.
Okem further noted that there were pockets of violence in some wards and some irregularities recorded in the area.
Reacting to NNPP’s claim, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Assistant Electoral Officer for Ogoja, Simon Akpa said he was unaware of the issue as it has not been formally reported to the commission.
He, however, noted that if the report is true and also obtainable not just in Ogoja but other parts of the country, then NNPP has a constitutional right to file an official complaint to INEC for further investigation.
In general, the Presidential and National Assembly elections held last Saturday, February 25, was largely peaceful in Ogoja Local Government Area of Cross River State.