– The APC governorship primary in Ebonyi has not gone down well with some stakeholders in the party
– One of such persons is a gubernatorial aspirant in the ruling party, Professor Bernard Odoh
– Odoh said that he is opposed to the results of the poll because the delegates that made the primary were allegedly forged
Professor Bernard Odoh, an All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship aspirant for the 2019 election in Ebonyi, has rejected the outcome of the party’s primary that produced Senator Sonni Ogbuoji as the candidate.
Odoh who addressed newsmen on Wednesday in Abakaliki, said the election that held between Sunday and Monday, was marred with irregularities, the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports.
Odoh, a former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), alleged that fake delegate lists from Ikwo and Ezza south local government areas were used for the exercise.
Senator Domingo Obande, Ebonyi APC governorship primary election committee chairman, had declared Ogbuoji winner, having secured 785 votes to defeat Odoh his closest rival who scored 516 votes and six other aspirants.
He regretted that the delegate lists from the local government areas were only known to one man and tailored to favour a particular aspirant.
He said that the aspirants protested against the use of the lists for the purpose of conducting the primary election.
Odoh called on the leadership of the party to cancel votes from Ikwo and Ezza south local government areas.
“For 30 minutes, we argued and vehemently disagreed with the committee not to use the controversial lists, but they insisted and went ahead with the conduct of the poll,” Odoh said.
He stressed that he rejected the outcome of the governorship primary based on alleged use of forged delegate lists. He urged his supporters to remain calm and law abiding and assured that he would use every legitimate means to upturn the result.
“I want to say that I reject the result of the just concluded Ebonyi APC governorship primary election based on observed irregularities. The delegate lists from Ikwo and Ezza South were forged; the document is inconsistent with the document that the party presented when the committee arrived Abakaliki.
“Therefore, we cannot allow a forged document to be used to choose the party’s flag bearer and again I had no access to the delegate lists used in the election from the two LGAs.
“These delegates were not part of the delegates produced during the May congresses of our great party. I am a law abiding person and I respect procedures.
“We have commenced a process of appeal to the appeal panel; if the process is fair and credible, I will accept the outcome, but given what happened, I don’t accept the outcome,” he added.
Meanwhile, TRACKNEWS.NG reported that the APC in Ebonyi had said that it would pick candidates for the 2019 general elections through consensus as the approach “best suits the state’s peculiarities.’’
This was the resolution reached after an emergency State Executive Committee (SEC) meeting, held on Wednesday night, September 5, in Abakaliki, with APC leaders, including past members of the national and state assemblies in attendance.
