Opposition parties reject results

Nigerian opposition parties rejected the results of the 12 April parliamentary elections in statements issued on Tuesday as the ruling party appeared headed for a comfortable victory. By the end of Tuesday, President Olusegun Obasanjo's People's Democratic Party had won 170 of 360 seats in the House of Representatives, with a number of seats still undeclared. Its closest rival was the All Nigeria People's Party with 81 seats and the Alliance of Democracy with 30 seats. Other parties had won six seats. In the senatorial race, the PDP was also leading, winning 52 of the 109 seats to the ANPP's 25 and five for AD. ANPP Chairman Don Etiebet, speaking on behalf of 28 opposition parties, rejected the results as flawed. He accused the ruling party of manipulating election officials, outright rigging and tampering with results. "The results are spurious and the whole elections flawed," Etiebet told reporters. The parties want the elections cancelled and a rerun conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission. However, he said the parties' objections would not affect their participation in Saturday's presidential elections and subsequent polls. Most observers said they noticed significant flaws in the conduct of the elections but did not think they substantially affected the outcome. In a national broadcast on Monday night Obasanjo expressed satisfaction with the conduct of the vote, despite delays in parts of the country and disruptive violence in others. There were a number of isolated incidents, and over 20 deaths due to violence. Thugs were reported to have snatched ballot boxes in the southeastern states of Anambra and Rivers; clashes in the southeastern state of Enugu claimed four lives; in parts of the Niger Delta, voting was disrupted by ethnic Ijaw militants, who said their demands that government redraw what they perceived as unfair constituency boundaries were not met. Militants of the Federated Niger Delta Ijaw Communities on Tuesday restated their resolve to stop the presidential elections in their areas. "We are not going to vote for people who are not alive to our plight," Dan Ekpebide, a leader of the group, told IRIN.