Senator Smart Adeyemi, representing Kogi West Senatorial District, and three other aspirants have rejected the results of the April 14, Kogi All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship primary elections in the State.
The aggrieved aspirants made their positions known on Saturday at a press briefing in Abuja, where they unanimously claimed that the scheduled primary elections did not hold at all on Friday, wondering how a winner was declared without any polls in the State.
Other aspirants who were at the briefing are Professor Stephen Ocheni, who is a former Minister of State, Labour and Productivity, Shuiabu Audu, the son of late ex-Governor Abubakar Audu and Murtala Yakubu Ajaka, a member of the APC national working Committee.
Senator Adeyemi, who spoke on behalf of others, claimed that there was no primary election in the State, arguing that the the declaration of Ahmed Usman Ododo as the APC governorship candidate in the November election was null and void.
Accordingly, he called on the national Chairman of the APC, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, the Party’s national working Committee (NWC), the President-elect, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the Vice President-elect, Kashim Shettima, not to allow the result of the election that produced Ododo to stand.
His words: This press conference is to discuss a new phenomenon of electoral malpractices and the embeded corruption in the electoral process of our country. I have heard of rigging of elections, but I have not heard of the new phenomenon which we must do all we can to stop in this country.
“The Kogi governorship primary election was scheduled for yesterday (Friday) but we came out and waited till 2 pm when the election was supposed to end but we did not see any INEC officials and we left. The next thing we heard was that results were announced. This means that results were prepared even before the commencement of voting. Announcements were made and I was taken aback.
“This is the worst malpractice, the worst form of rigging unprecedented in the history of Nigeria; that you will write results of a governorship primary election when some people were persuaded and cajoled to step down.
“Those of us who had the courage to stand because we believed that it was a democracy, if we were defeated, we don’t bother. In fact, if there was election and it was rigged, we know that it was rigged. But where there was no election at all and somebody will have the odacity to write results and went ahead to announce it, is not acceptable.
“Seven of us contested. The two other aspirants are with us. In fact, one of them addressed a press conference yesterday. So, we are representing the six of us here.
“The national Secretariat of APC and the Resident Electrol Commissioner in Kogi should be prepared to explain and to tell Nigerians if there was election in the governorship primary of Kogi State. The primary election was not conducted.
“All of us mobilised our members and the people trooped out in their thousands but none of the officials of INEC nor even the Panel that supposed to conduct the election were anywhere to be found. They were in town but nobody came out.
“The primary election in Kogi State was just allocation of votes. Some of us they felt we are problem to them, they reduced our votes drastically. Of course there was no voting. But let me tell you this, the one purported to be the winner is the Auditor-General of local governments in Kogi State, and you know what Auditor-Generals do.
“Some of us sitted here, we had to conduct a parallel election because they didn’t come out. Nigerians must rise to this because it is not the issue of Kogi. If there is any crime committed anywhere in Nigeria and you say it doesn’t concern you, somebody will copy it in your State. So, you must show concern; this is a rape of democracy.”
