Ahead of the January 9, 2016 rescheduled election, the Bayelsa State Governor, Seriake Dickson, has urged the Southern Ijaw youths to mobilise their people and vote massively for the Peoples Democratic Party.
The governor, in a statement on Sunday by his Chief Press Secretary, Daniel Iworiso-Markson, noted that the party had already won the election, in spite of the Independent National Electoral Commission declaring it inconclusive.
The election in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of the state and about 112 units in other LGAs were cancelled by the electoral umpire, rendering the December 5 and 6 elections in the state inconclusive.
A rerun has been slated for January 9, 2016 to enable INEC to decide, who between Dickson and the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Chief Timipre Sylva, would win the governorship poll.
Before the election was declared inconclusive, Dickson had polled 105,748 votes in seven out of the eight LGAs, remaining SILGA as against Sylva’s 72,534, indicating that Dickson beat Sylva by 33,214 votes.
But Dickson, who expressed gratitude to the youth for their show of solidarity, noted that victory would not be completed until the Southern Ijaw election was won by the PDP, as the party represents the overall interest of the Ijaw people.
The governor said, “The opposition is afraid of defeat that is why they decided to mar the poll with violence. In spite of that, be peaceful and conduct yourselves properly during the forthcoming poll, as all your leaders are behind the party.
“In a stakeholders’ meeting in Abuja, all the agencies of the government, including the security, INEC and others have agreed to conduct a peaceful election, without bias from any interested party, as the result will be determined by the use of Permanent Voter Card.”
On their part, the youths of Southern Ijaw have declared total support and re-affirmed their resolve to vote Dickson in the re-scheduled January 9 election in the area.
The youth, represented by the Presidents of the various communities in the LGA, in an enlarged meeting with Dickson in the Government House, Yenagoa, premised their support for him on “his sincerity of purpose and sterling leadership qualities in the almost four years of his government.”
According to them, Dickson had proved himself as a worthy leader, whose achievements would stand the test of time, particularly in the areas of security, infrastructure development and human capacity building.
