The Labour Party (LP) governorship candidate in Lagos State, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, has appealed to Lagos residents, especially the youths, not to be deterred by the outcome of last Saturday’s presidential and National Assembly election.
Rather, he urged them to come out en masse and vote out the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the March 11 governorship and State assembly elections.
Rhodes-Vivour made the appeal on Wednesday during a press conference in the Lekki area of the State.
He frowned at the alleged harassment and intimidation of voters, as well as the violence that characterised last Saturday’s election in the State. He also tasked the security agencies to protect Lagos residents against intimidation and attacks by political thugs.
“This was not a tribal victory. We won in places where the opposition has never won in two decades; we won in Alimosho, we won in Ikeja and several other places,” he said.
He said LP presidential candidate Peter Obi’s votes in Lagos were manipulated because results weren’t electronically transmitted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Rhodes-Vivour said, “From our situation room, we see that we won over 900, 000 votes and this was all because you came out. This was won without any voter inducement. We cannot stop thanking the good people of Lagos. We made history in that election; we took Lagos State and restored it back to the people.
“We unequivocally reject the process by which the results were announced because it was not electronically as promised by INEC.”
The governorship candidate of the Boot Party in Lagos and a former commissioner under the Akinwunmi Ambode administration, Wale Oluwo had stepped down for Rhodes-Vivour in February.
Asked whether he is looking into more alliances with opposition parties to secure victory at the polls, Rhodes-Vivour said: “We’re talking with the owners of the structures of the PDP, the people that matter in the PDP.”
Aside from the incumbent governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, who is seeking reelection under the banner of the APC, Rhodes-Vivour has his PDP counterpart, Olajide Adediran aka Jandor to contend with in the exercise.
In the presidential election, LP’s Obi polled 582,454 votes in Lagos to trounce the flag bearer of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and former governor of the state, Bola Tinubu who scored 572,606 votes.
In total, Obi won 11 states and the Federal Capital Territory, but Tinubu scored the highest votes in total and was later on Wednesday announced the winner of the poll and Nigeria’s President-elect.