Fayose and Obanikoro deny Audio file alleging rigging in Ekiti 2014 Polls

An audio recording allegedly showing how the June 2014 Ekiti State governorship election was rigged, has been released online.

The recording, which was on Sahara Reporters, purportedly captured the voices of the Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, a military general who was in charge of the election, Senator Iyiola Omisore and former Minister of State for Defence, Musiliu Obanikoro, in a meeting where they allegedly gave directives to the military to favour the Peoples Democratic Party.

But in a swift reaction to the development, Fayose said he never held any meeting with anyone to rig election. In a statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Idowu Adelusi, on Friday, the governor described the audio clip as a new calculated attempt by the All Progressives Congress to discredit the election results.

Reports said the audio recording was made by one Captain Sagir Koli of the 32nd Artillery Brigade in Ekiti State, who was allegedly present during the meeting. A voice alleged to be that of Fayose in the audio recording complained that the military had arrested some of his supporters with arms and had failed to release them.

Another part of the recording also referred to some stickers which served as forms of identification through which the military was supposed to identify foot soldiers of the PDP that should not be detained during the election. A voice directed the military officer to arrest the Director-General of the Kayode Fayemi campaign organisation, Mr. Bimbo Daramola. It was claimed that Brig.-Gen. Aliyu Momoh and the Minister of Police Affairs, Caleb Olubolade, were also present at the meeting.

The following quotes are taken from the transcription of the audio recording with the names of those who allegedly made the comments:

Fayose: This brigadier general, I was governor of this state 12 years ago, you would probably be a captain or a major, but we give God all the glory. When you talk to this man he would argue from morning to night. What we want to eat does not allow us to know our right.

“Number two, my younger brother retired in the army as brigadier-general, when you explain to this man, its argument, argument, argument. Today, we met and agreed on how to work, myself, Omisore and all the heads. We agreed on a strategy to use, and the nine that would join us and all you expect me to do, I have done.

Obanikoro: We have a challenge on our hands, how do we resolve this challenge? I am here, the governor is here, when we call you, we want action, it should not take two hours to get action, the governor said he called you, somebody was detained for over two hours, I want to know who was asked to be disarming those people.

Caleb Olubolade: Another thing, General relax, sit down. You are a soldier man, you are working for us. You have more shock absorber than we bloody civilians. Forget about that there are some things that are not clear to us. One – that your boys are disarming even the police. (General “are the police for us? Yes now! Yes now!”)

However, Fayose had described the audio clip as fake. He said his voice and those of others in the clip could have been faked using technology like Natural Voices.

Also, Obanikoro denied reports that his voice was one of those on the audio recording. Obanikoro said in a statement released by his Special Adviser on Media and Strategy, Ohimai Amaize,   that “you will never find him anywhere in the world talking about rigging an election in favour of anyone. Senator Obanikoro is initiating a legal action against Sahara Reporters in New York and Nigeria for defamation of character,” the statement said.

Culled from ...Punch