Money Politicking

MONEY POLITICKING

Last Saturday’s election in Ekiti State was a case of battle of survival of the fittest between the two leading political parties, PDP and APC as both parties showered prospective voters with cash.

Many voters received cash and other gifts from politicians yesterday to vote for particular candidates in today’s election.

Some beneficiaries of the largesse, who spoke to Kristal Media on condition of anonymity, said they got the sum of N4,000 each.

It was observed that the people may have given up on political promises usually made during election campaigns, therefore, have chosen to collect certain amount offered them for their votes irrespective of the candidate or political party.

This is coming as two governorship candidates of Mega Party Bisi Omoyeni and Accord Party, Abiodun Aluko raised alarm of vote-buying by political parties.

Omoyeni alleged that “some political parties had been buying votes by giving money to voters openly but said he was confident of winning despite this because he was the best of all the candidates.

The governorship Candidate of the Accord Party, Abiodun Aluko alleged “that the All Progressives Congress of openly distributing N5,000 cash to voters to influence them to vote for their candidate while APC leaders were paying N5000 per vote, the PDP leaders were paying N4,000 apart from the N3000 they paid to the accounts of civil servants and pensioners.

Deputy Governor of Ekiti State and the flagbearer of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Saturday’s governorship election, has said the Federal Government moved in billions of naira used in financing Kayode Fayemi’s election in two bullion vans to Ondo State House.

While addressing some journalists in Ado-Ekiti on Thursday, Lere Olayinka, Director of Media and Publicity of the Kolapo Olusola Campaign Organisation (KOCO), said the sum is part of the $321m recovered Abacha loot.

He claimed that $50m of the recovered fund was flown from Abuja to Akure Airport and afterwards to Fayemi’s hometown in Ekiti with two bullion vans to support the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate.

He said: “Last week Saturday, two bullion vehicles were moved to the Akure Airport to evacuate cash brought from Abuja by a chartered flight.

“The flight landed when it was raining and all staff members of the airport were barred from going near the aircraft while the cash was evacuated into the two bullion vehicles.

“After offloading the huge cash, the bullion van first moved to the Ondo State Government House in Akure from where they left for Isan Ekiti, the hometown of the APC governorship candidate, Dr Kayode Fayemi.

“It was withdrawn immediately and moved with a private jet to Akure. Also, apart from the N2.5bn, another $50m (about N18bn) was taken from the $321m recovered from the late Abacha family.

“Our question is, how can a government that claims to be fighting corruption release billions of naira from the public coffers for the governorship election of a single state? Where is their fight against corruption?

“We must tell Fayemi and his APC that the conscience of the people of Ekiti cannot be purchased and we call on the people of Ekiti to resist the planned use of the stolen funds to buy their votes of Saturday.”

However,  Wole Olujobi, the Director, Media and Publicity, Kayode Fayemi Campaign Organisation, denied the allegations.

“Discerning minds will note the lies contained in the story by a single logic that it took Eleka (Olusola) and Olayinka a whole week after the leak of funds movement before they alerted Nigerians about a purported money cargo being offloaded in Akure for Fayemi’s election in Ekiti,” he said.

“By this lie from the pit of hell, we know that the PDP is trying to paint a picture that it is a comrade-in-crime with APC after Fayose’s 2014 poll fraud funded with the loot from the office of the National Security Adviser.”