All Progressives Congress, APC, governors bidding to use the indirect or consensus options in producing party candidates were Thursday coming under fresh threats with the injunction that a protest from any stakeholder or aspirant will lead to the cancellation of the exercise and resort to direct primary.
The seeming opposition by the governors to the direct primary option, Vanguard gathered Thursday, was a significant reason for the high price put to the nomination forms of the party.
The governors, it was gathered, had as a result of the rebuff of their pleas for indirect primaries chosen not to fund the direct primary, a development that has compelled the national secretariat to mobilise funds from the sale of the forms to fund the direct primary option.
“Anywhere they do indirect or consensus and one of the aspirants or any of the stakeholders complain, that exercise would be cancelled, and the national headquarters will send people to go and do direct primaries,” a high-level source in the national party secretariat spoke yesterday.
Asked of the party’s capacity to conduct direct primaries in the light of the logistics involved in gathering party members to meet at ward levels to choose their candidates, the source said: “That is part of the reasons the nomination forms are high because we want to raise money from the proceeds of the sale of the forms to fund the direct primaries.
“The governors who were supposed to fund the direct primaries are the ones complaining. So, their strategy is to stop funding for the party as they are already saying that they don’t have money for it.
“So, the party doesn’t want anyone to hold it to ransom, especially knowing someone like Comrade.”
Justifying the decision to go ahead with direct primaries, the source said: “If anybody decides to protest, the national leadership will conduct direct primaries because they don’t want a situation where anybody will be disfranchised or force anyone out of the party.
“These are issues that have to stop. The national chairman wants a situation where everybody will be comfortable with the choice of who would be representing the party in elections.”
How Amosun’s preferred guber candidate emerged
Meanwhile, in a near raucous democratic consensus exercise in Ogun State, Abdulkabir Adekunle Akinlade, a member of the House of Representatives, representing Yewa-South/Ipokia Federal Constituency, emerged as the putative consensus nominee of the party.
The exercise was supervised by Governor Ibikunle Amosun and Ogun West elders of the party after hours of meeting in Ayetoro, Yewa North Local Government Area of the state, to pick the zone’s governorship candidate for the 2019 election.
Scores of aspirants from Ogun West had been desirous of succeeding Amosun on the platform of APC. Among the more prominent had been Speaker Suraj Adekunbi, Governor Amosun’s Chief of staff, Tolu Odebiyi, Abiodun Isiaq Akinlade, the Commissioner for Forestry, Kola Lawal, Chairman, Local Government Service Commission, Rotimi Rahmon, and Abayomi Hunye.
Vanguard gathered that the long list of aspirants was trimmed to the duo of Odebiyi and Akinlade who made the final list.
The governor was, however, believed to have a preference for Akinlade and through his body language got him to be endorsed by the elders.
Vanguard also gathered the inclination towards Akinlade first emerged at an earlier meeting that took place about midnight of Wednesday at the private residence of late party chieftain, Deacon Poju Adeyemi, located in Government Reservation Area, GRA, Ibara, Abeokuta.
A source at the meeting told Vanguard that the party executives, elders, and other aspirants had engaged in a closed-door meeting which lasted for hours. News of the development was first broken by Chairman Ogun West Elders Council, Mohammed Olagbayi.
Akinlade hails from Agosasa, Ipokia Local Government Area of Ogun State and is popularly called ‘Triple A.’
Meanwhile, a presidential aspirant on the platform of All Progressives Congress, APC, Mr. Adamu Garba II, has called on the party’s National Chairman, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, to urgently convene a National Working Committee, NWC, meeting with all presidential aspirants in attendance, in order to resolve contentious issues over direct primaries and prices of nomination forms.
He also dismissed fears trailing the adoption of direct primaries, saying it would promote the culture of inclusiveness in APC.
Adamu Garba II, in a letter to Oshiomhole, cautioned against practices that could exclude key stakeholders from party events leading to the general election.
He said: “We call on the National Working Committee, NWC, to rise to the occasion, by adopting direct primaries which is the best democratic practice for all elective positions on the platform of the All Progressives Congress.
“This will further enhance participation and promote inclusion within the rank and file of the APC. We have observed the recent speculative news on the prices of forms from the Presidency and we consider it to be a dent on the party’s effort to attract youth-inclusiveness. We humbly ask that the NWC reconsider and review this
“We request that all subsequent stakeholders’ meeting with the President in attendance to include all other aspirants, who have publicly declared their intention to run for the office of the President on the platform of the APC.
“It is very important for the NWC to provide a level playing field for all aspirants in the race.
“The youth demography accounts for over 65 percent of the electorate and also constitutes the majority of the APC machinery. It will, therefore, be counterproductive for our party to have a disposition that does not accommodate the interest and aspirations of young stakeholders within the APC.”
