Aspirant Drags APC To Court

In less than two months to the general elections, one of the aggrieved aspirants who lost the primary election conducted in Bauchi State last year has taken the All Progressives Congress, APC to court.


A governorship aspirant who contested the APC primary in the state, Comrade Mohammed Abdullahi Tanko Ningi, told Nigerian Pilot at the weekend that he had filed a fresh suit before a Federal High Court, Bauchi against the party over conduct of the primary.

Ningi, who was handed over a compulsory retirement by the state government, joined the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC and the APC governorship candidate, Mohammed Abdullahi Abubakar as defendants.

According to him, he is challenging the decision of the party to endorse Muhammad as the party’s candidate, adding that the result of the primary election announced by the APC Electoral Committee in which Abubakar was declared winner was contrary to the laws of the party.

He said the party’s constitution stated that members of the Election Committee must come from outside the state, alleging that an indigene of Bauchi, Dr. Danjuma Dabo, who was not a member of the committee, joined in the counting of votes which he said violated the guidelines.

 

The aspirant further alleged that before the primary election started, the chairman of the Election Committee, Mr. Oluwa Rotimi Akeredolu, announced that 2,854 delegates were accredited for the election, but at the end of the voting, 2,901 votes were counted, which clearly shows over-voting.

“According to the party laws where you record over voting, the election should be canceled, but they went ahead and declared Abubakar as the winner. Six of the eight aspirants who contested the election wrote separate petitions to the APC’s national leadership and a reminder on December 4 when the primary was held. Till date, the party refused to take any action over our complaints and for that reason I decided to take legal action to seek for Justice,” Ningi said.

He pleaded with the court to stop Abubakar from parading himself as Bauchi APC governorship candidate, adding that the party should be stopped from submitting Abubakar’s name to INEC as well as stop the electoral body from recognising Abubakar as the party’s candidate.

Meanwhile, the state’s APC Publicity Secretary, Awwal Jallah, when contacted, said: “the aggrieved aspirants did not present their grievances to the right channel in the party, because if they did, it would have received prompt attention.”

Jallah promised that the party will act accordingly after it received the hearing processes on the suit.
Meanwhile, the country’s main opposition party recently accused the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and President Goodluck Jonathan of trying to truncate Nigeria’s democracy because of their desperation to remain in power.

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