…Claims electoral umpire yet to notify ruling party
From Romanus Ugwu, Abuja
The national leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has reacted angrily to the trending report that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has rejected the party primary election that produced the incumbent governor of Ondo State last month.
The controversy trailing the primary election conducted last month April 20 for the September governorship election, came to the head when the electoral umpire recently declared that the party didn’t conduct primary election in the state.
The reports submitted by INEC Electoral Officers, who monitored the APC governorship primary election across the 18 local government areas of the state, revealed that there were no elections in the designated Registration Areas.
Trending reports signed and submitted by individual Electoral Officers received by one Dimas F. Emmanuel, ACLO, INEC headquarters, Abuja, 10 days after the election revealed that there were no election materials made available at the polling stations.
They claimed that members of the party that came out massively to perform their civic rights, were disappointed as there were no election materials while the election committee which ought to conduct the election did not show up.
The INEC Electoral Officer, who monitored Ifedore Local Government Area, Abai C.O (Mrs.), wrote that “The election of APC governorship primary was not held due to the unavailability of the election materials to be used and the absence of the Electoral Organising Committee in all the 10 Registration Areas till Monitoring team left late in the evening.”
However, reacting to the claims of the electoral umpire, Deputy National Organising Secretary of the party, Nze Chidi Duru, dismissed the report insisting that the party conducted a free, fair and transparent election that produced the candidate.
He said: “We conducted a free and fair election in Ondo state and a candidate emerged from the election. We (APC) have an eligible candidate for the November election in Ondo state.
“The party followed the process. The primary election committee conducted the election and presented their report to the National Working Committee (NWC). We (NWC) also received report from the Election Appeal Committee.
“This committee received some petitions, considered them and ruled that the election was conducted in line with the guidelines for the election and that it was free and fair exercise. The NWC then deliberated on the reports of the two committees and adopted them,” he said.
Asked that INEC alleged that there was no election in Ondo, Duru replied; “the committee that conducted the election in their report said that it was a free and fair exercise. This was expresslly indicated in their report.
“We don’t act on social media report. We have not recieve any report from INEC. The electoral body should have raised a query on the election to the committee and also to the appeal committee. We have no such report from INEC.
“It was on the strength of the reports of the two committees that NWC adopted the outcome of the election and issued a Certificate of Return to our candidate, who is Governor Lucky Ayiedatiwa. We have a candidate that will fly the party’s flag in the November 16 Ondo State Governorship Election,” Duru insisted.