Melaye survives recall as INEC says ‘verified signatures of 5.34% registered voters’ a sign of failure

The bid to recall Senator Dino Melaye from the Senate has finally crashed as only 5.34 per cent of the total 188,500 signatories to his recall petition were verified in an exercise held on Saturday.
The result of the verification released early Sunday in Lokoja by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) showed that 39,285 of the signatories were verified, out of which only 18,762 signatures were genuine.
The genuine signatories represent a dismal 5.34 per cent of the total signatories to the petition, which fell short of 51 per cent or 98, 364 signatures required for the petition to sail through.
It was observed that the verification failed largely due to fictitious and forged signatures and names of dead persons affixed to the recall petition by its promoters.
Some electorate in the Kogi West senatorial district had on June 24, 2017 submitted a petition to recall Melaye to the headquarters of the INEC in Abuja.
One Mr Cornelius Olowo led the petitioners to submit the recall petition which alleged poor representation as one of the reasons for the move to recall Melaye.
However, the INEC’s presiding officer for the verification exercise , Prof. Okente Morthy of the university of Abuja said that the number of signatures verified fell short of the number required.
He consequently gave the breakdown of the results of the verification exercise which took place in 552 polling units in seven local government areas in Kogi West senatorial district.
According to him, in Kogi Local Government with 46,727 registered voters and a total number of 24,459 signatures to the petition , only 2,335 were verified out of 2,566 signatures recorded during verification.
He said that at Kabba/Bunu Local Government with 59,319 registered voters and 27,910 petitioners , only 2,085 signatures were verified to be genuine out of 2,151 that came out for the exercise.
Also at Ijumu Local Government, with 46,810 registered voters and 24, 389 petitioners , 2,664 were verified out of 2, 811, the returning officer announced.
According to Morthy, others are Yagba East, 35, 329 registered voters, 18, 229 petitioners while 3,506 were verified out of 3, 580 recorded at verification.
At Mopa-Amuro Local Government with 18, 350 and 9, 173, signatures, 710 were verified out of the 729 recorded
However, the Returning Officer, said that there was violence in six polling units at the Mopa town towards the end of the exercise, forcing the INEC to nullify the exercise in the affected wards.
At Yagba West which has 35, 506 registered voters and 19, 444 signatories, only 3,729 petitioners were verified out of the 4,221 that turned up, the returning officer stated.
In Lokoja Local Government with 109,105 registered voters and 66,266 petitioners, INEC said that 3,763 were verified out of the 4, 810 recorded during the botched verification exercise.
It was learned that despite the attempt by thugs suspected to be working for the state government to intimidate voters, the people refused to succumb.
The presiding officer declared: “I affirm that the information on verification of signatures to the petition for the recall of Senator Dino David Melaye of Kogi West Senatorial District has taken place on this day, 28th day of April 2018, and that the verified signatures is 5.34 percent of the total number of registered voters in the constituency and has, therefore, not satisfied a requirement of the law for a referendum”.