By CHARLES IWUOHA

A pressure group, Zikist-Aminu Kano Patriots (ZAP), has commended President Muhammadu Buhari and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, for getting set for the coming election.

The group particularly hailed Buhari for the setting up of a transition team, when election has not even been held yet, describing it as a sign of total commitment towards free, fair, and credible elections.

Speaking to newsmen in Enugu on Sunday, Secretary General of the group, Dr Steve Igweze, enumerated the sequence of events which he said rekindled the confidence of ZAP members nationwide.

According to him, apart from the 2022 Electoral Act, a progenitor of electronic transmission of results, which he described as “Vote-Rigging-Vaccine (VRV)”, President Buhari “has not only assured the world of his commitment to free, fair and transparent elections, but has gone ahead to free our undergraduates to massively participate in the elections by granting them holidays.”

“Added to this is Mr President’s setting up of the Transition Council, headed by Boss Mustapha the SGF. This shows his preparedness to hand over seamlessly.

“We cherish the opportunity the holidays offered to our dear undergraduates to massively participate, decide who presides over our affairs in the next four years, so as to avoid mass exodus of youths to abroad. Mr President accordingly has patriotically thrust their future and their destiny in their hands.

“With over 70% of the age grade between 18 and 50 years dominating the 93 million registered voters, Nigerians youths cannot blame ethnicity, religion or sundry fault lines if they fail to vote for the candidate with verifiable better character, more competence and no history of looting,” ZAP submitted.

On Professor Mahmood Yakubu, Chairman of INEC, ZAP commended his tenacity, diligent planning and robust defence of two phase elections at the National Council of State meeting last Friday.

“We commend INEC Chairman for his resistance to anti-democrats, cum Election Results Deniers of Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro’s variant, whose intent is to muddle the general election and cause confusion.

“They were least concerned how cumbersome it is to count and electronically transmit five different results to INEC Results Viewing (IReV) portal and most importantly the risk the disparity between the less than 5% percentage of INEC’s permanent staff and over 95% temporary staff pose,” the group stated.

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