By Gabriel Enogholase

BENIN—CONTRARY to reports that late Admiral Augustus Aikhomu voted four times during the 2007 governorship election in Edo State which saw former Governor Oserheimen Osunbor of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, emerge as the winner, a study of the electoral results has revealed that late former Chief of General Staff never voted four times.

* Late Aikhomu

The study claimed that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, created the fallacy by donating four times the number of voters accredited in Edo Central, which was less than 20 per cent of the total number of voters in the state to the senatorial district, in a bid to ensure that the PDP won the election.

Mr. Frank Ehiosun, whose new book, ‘Chart O’, is stirring controversy as the 2016 governorship election approaches, while speaking at a public presentation of the book to newsmen in Benin City said that in 2007, INEC created the situation where Edo South which had 60 per cent of the state voting population got less voters compared to Edo Central.

“The voters register for Central was quadrupled such that persons like Michael Tyson, Michael Jackson who are Americans resident outside Nigerian shores and not qualified to vote or be voted for, were accredited by INEC, which also created the situation where Aikhomu appeared to have voted four times.”

He added that whereas Aikhomu actually registered once, in Unit 4 of Ward six in Esan Central, INEC accredited twice and recorded his name as number 15, 16, 34 and 39 in the manual and electronic register for the April 14 2007 poll, where he ‘voted’, a record four times, whereas in actual fact the late Vice-President did not.

“The truth is that Admiral Augustus Aikhomu, a well-respected statesman, did not vote more than once. Those paid to do the ‘make up,’ accreditation were not detailed about the factor of multiple appearance of so many voters in the electronic register.

“We observed in this exercise that multiple accreditation was more prevalent in Edo Central senatorial district, where more than 75percent of the votes were invalidated as a result of this flaw,” he added.