Posted by The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) national chairman, Iyorchia Ayu, has asked the European Union (EU) to deploy “a significant” number of election observers to Nigeria to witness the general election in 2023.
Ayu made the demand on Thursday at the PDP offices in Abuja when he met with the Mette Bakken-led EU election exploratory mission to Nigeria.
According to the PDP chairman, thorough monitoring of the election will guard against fraud.
“As a party, we are ready to take the necessary action in preparation for the general elections in 2023. However, we are concerned about the state’s propensity and ability to use vital technologies against us.
So that we are not taken advantage of once more, we must pay strict attention, he stated.
In the past, the ruling APC did what they do best in those areas: they brought votes that undermined the will of the people. It’s crucial that the EU sends numerous observers before the elections, even if we will police our ballots.
“This place requires a sizable EU observer mission. We reject token missionary efforts. This is due to the size of Nigeria, some of whose states being larger than several EU member-states.
Also required among the observers are individuals with technological skills. Technology has replaced manual election observation.
In order to prevent the APC from undermining the democratic will, you need to maintain communicating with the government and important stakeholders.
Election observer missions, according to Ayu, are essential for democratic, transparent, and credible elections and will deter those in charge of the process from engaging in corruption.
“We don’t want to get taken advantage of once more.
We firmly believe that the general elections of 2019 gave us the president.
We suffered an injury in 2019 and don’t want another one in 2023, he remarked.
“Nigerians are, as far as I can tell, a really dynamic people. We expressed our opinions even when under military authority.
We created this political party in order to ensure that the military handed over control by speaking our opinions.