Chief Mao Ohuabunwa, who was recently sacked from the Senate as the Senator representing Abia North Senatorial Zone, has called on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to expedite action in conducting a fresh election in the area.

Ohuabunwa told newsmen in Umuahia on Tuesday that it has become expedient for INEC to conduct the poll to give whoever would emerge ample opportunity to represent the zone’s interest in the making of the 2016 Appropriation Bill.

Ohuabunwa was returned as the elected Senator to represent Abia North in the March 28, 2015 Presidential and National Assembly elections. Two of his opponents, Chief David Ogba Onuoha (Bourdex) of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and Chief Orji Uzor Kalu of Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA) questioned the election. Ohuabunwa floored the duo at the National and State House of Assembly Election Petition Tribunal. Kalu took the matter to the Appeal Court, Owerri Division, which quashed the ruling of the lower tribunal and ordered INEC to conduct fresh senatorial election in Abia North.

Ohuabunwa said though shocked by the Appeal Court ruling, he has taken it in his stride and was “moving forward.” He stressed that it was incumbent on INEC to conduct the poll without wasting further time so as not to deprive Abia North the opportunity of getting their fair share from the 2016 budget.

Speaking on the adverse effect of the vacant seat of the zone in the Senate, Ohuabunwa said: “Those suffering are people from Abia North, not Mao Ohuabunwa. Like today, the President is going to present the budget: Abia North will not be there. And everything I have prepared since I went to the Senate in the past three or four months was in readiness for the 2016 budget because there was no programme of Abia North that was in the 2015 Appropriation Act.

“Within the three months, I brought the Rural Electrification Agency to survey the entire Abia North in terms of electricity. You are aware of the motion that I moved which brought the Senate Committee on Works chaired by Barnabas Gemade and we moved round all parts of Abia North. All was in preparation for 2016 budget.

“But I believe that if INEC will act fast and Abia North reclaiming its mandate which they gave to me through me, maybe we will get there to make sure we pursue our goals before this Appropriation Bill goes on, because if we don’t get back and this appropriation goes on, which means Abia North is lost for two years. If we miss in the appropriation this year, which means that Abia North, part of Abia State and part of Igboland, will definitely miss out. It is unfortunate.”

The two-time House of Representatives member (1999 – 2007) expressed optimism that he would still floor his challengers at the fresh polls.

He said: “This mandate (his previous victory) is from God and people of Abia North. My mandate is not money mandate. I am not in that money circle. I have always presented myself to the people, related with the people and God, in His infinite Mercy, at this time, through Abia North, gave me this mandate. Since they (INEC) said we should go back to the people of Abia North, I have no other option than to come to back to Abia North people and say, God gave me this mandate through you people, now look at what has happened. I didn’t get this mandate from court, I got it from you people, so, I have come back to Abia North to say look at what has happened to the mandate you gave to me and we have to go and reclaim our mandate and I know that Abia North people are poised , really prepared to reclaim that mandate.”

Ohuabunwa said he was confident that the electorate from the zone would “do what they did before and even do better now because some people have seen within these few months, what God has used me to do and those who were on the borderline are now a little more convinced and some have called me to say with what you are doing, we won’t let this happen.”

He likened the nullification of his election to aborting mid-air, a flight just about to take-off, adding that the court ruling seemed premeditated as it granted the appelants’ reliefs they did not seek.

He argued that both Bourdex and Kalu even accepted that the senatorial election in the zone, particularly Bende and Isuikwuato local government areas, was okay and wondered why the court ordered fresh election in the entire zone instead of the areas where the polls were questioned.

•Photo shows Senator Ohuabunwa.

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