Nigerian citizens reaident in the United States of America under the auspices of American Coalition for Justice and Democracy Inc. have obtained permission to stage a protest against the emergence of Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, as Nigeria’s President-elect.
The group, in a memo, stated that the purpose of the agitation was to register their displeasure with the election outcome and to express their total rejection of the presidential poll.
Recall that the APC presidential candidate was declared winner of the election held on 25 February, 2023 by Mahmood Yakubu, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, amidst controversies and agitations by Nigerians and opposition political parties.
INEC had failed to adhere to its guidelines in conduct of the presidential election in the country.
The body assured the people of Nigeria that votes would be directly transmitted to the server from polling units via the Biometric Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, but the body surprisingly made a U-turn midway at the voting process, citing technical hitches.
There were also reports of cases where INEC polling officers were given wrong passwords which prevented them from uploading the results to the server.
However, the US group condemned the outcome of the election, and scheduled a protest against it on 3 April, 2023.
The protest is to take place opposite the US seat of power, White House, precisely at the Lafayette Park between 8am and 12pm.
Speaking on the aim of the agitation, Franklin Ekechukwu, the group’s convener stated that, “Nigerian election was conducted on February 25, 2023, the institution that conducted the election did not follow their guideline nor rule of law in accordance with democratic principles.
“We in the diaspora are demonstrating to call the attention of the US government and Biden administration to not recognise the projected winner.”
