#ElectionBuzzNig’23
The governorship primary of the Oyo State All Progressives Congress (APC) did not hold as scheduled on Thursday. However, barring last minute changes, the primary would hold tomorrow on Friday.
Although no official statement has been released to that effect, it was gathered that insecurity was identified as a top reason by the Senator Tokunbo Afikuyomi-led Committee sent to the state to conduct the election.
The air of uncertainty around the conduct of the primary had been looming since early Thursday morning when the aspirants were invited to a meeting, held behind closed doors by the committee sent to conduct the election.
Two separate meetings were held on Thursday at the Premier Hotel, Ibadan, while the primary election was to hold at the Obafemi Awolowo Stadium, formerly known as Liberty Stadium, Oke Ado, Ibadan.
Although all the six aspirants for the governorship election including Niyi Akintola, Akeem Agbaje, Adebayo Adelabu, Akeem Alao, Teslim Folarin and Dr Azeez Adeduntan attended the first meeting, only Folarin was absent at the second meeting.
Immediately after the meeting, however, one of the aspirants, Niyi Akintola said he would not be participating in the primary, saying the process had been skewed to favour a particular aspirant.
Although the primary was expected to commence at 10am, delegates and supporters of each aspirant had started arriving the venue as early as 8am but none of the major players and aspirants got to the venue earlier than 4pm owing to unresolved issues that sorrounded the delegates list to be used for the conduct of the election.
Despite the disagreement among the aspirants at the Premier Hotel meeting, it was resolved that the primary should go on as planned while aspirants could seek legal means to address their grievances afterwards.
Hope of the conduct of the primary later came alive upon the arrival of the Senator Afikuyomi-led Committee on the mission to conduct the primary.
According to sources, the committee members were disappointed at the large number of people inside the stadium, which they said could be a security risk to the conduct of the primary.
All the aspirants were later called to appeal to their supporters who are not delegates to leave the main bowl of the stadium, but the effort did not yield any result.
It was gathered that the situation however forced members of the Governorship Primary Election Committee to leave the venue at around 6:30pm.
Not long afterwards, the aspirants began to leave the stadium but many of the party supporters refused to leave the venue claiming one of the aspirants could be planning to outsmart others after many people might have left.
Reacting to the development, the Oyo State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Mutiu Agboke, said whatever could have led to the postponement is of less concern to INEC because the commission was only at the venue to monitor proceedings.
He said although the commission had not been formally notified of the postponement, he assured that officials would be available anytime the party said it is ready to conduct the primary again.
Efforts to reach the leadership of the party in the state proved abortive as calls made to their telephone lines were not connecting as at the time of this report.
Emmanuel Ukoh
