From Ahmad SAKA, Bauchi
43 aggrieved members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Bauchi State have called on the National working Committee of the party to order fresh primary elections in eleven state constituencies in Bauchi state.
Spokesperson of the aggrieved contestants, Saleh A Umar Nabayi stated at a press conference held at the secretariat of the Nigeria Union of Journalists NUJ,Bauchi
The aggrieved members expressed fear that the already elected local government delegates that will partake in the election are already being compromised, therefore, the National Working Committee should order a fresh election of the LGA delegates or allow for a direct Primary election.
He said that, “with our greatest dismay, we are here before you to express to the National Working Committee and the entire World about our grievances –particularly concerning our great party, the All Progressive Congress (APC Bauchi State). You will recall that the State Assembly primary election has been done but we believe that it has not been concluded”.
“Before you this afternoon, are about forty-three loyal party members of the APC who lawfully purchased nomination/expression of interest forms to contest for various state house of Assembly seats”, they said.
“These are our reasons: our Party did not inform any aspirant that any of the serving members will be given an automatic ticket” .
“We all obtained forms as required by the Constitution and followed all the instructions given by our leaders, we canvassed for support across our constituencies and patiently waited for the day of primary election”,
Nabiyi said that, “The election was slated for Thursday, we sent our agents to the party secretariat, they were waiting but sadly election materials were not distributed to the officials till dusk without any communication from the election panel”.
He said that, “When they arrived late in the evening, they said that they could not distribute the materials that same Thursday, claiming that some of the constituencies in Bauchi State are far away from the Capital so they pleaded with us that everyone should reconvene on Friday at 7:am when the election materials would be distributed. We all left for our various destinations and returned on Friday morning”.
“On that Friday, we were surprised to hear from the Committee that all the state constituencies that have serving lawmakers have been given automatic tickets, therefore there won’t be an election in those areas”, he further stated.
He claimed that, “They said that they have received orders from the National Headquarters to give automatic tickets to all the serving state Assembly members. We expressed our anger to them that we are not in support of that arrangement. We insisted that elections must be held in all the state constituencies –including those with serving members”.
He explained that, “The State Chairman pleaded with us that we should meet the following Saturday, though, he was not at the meeting but he was represented by his deputy. They promised to forward our complaint to Abuja. At the same time, we discussed this with the current APC gubernatorial candidate, Ambassador Abubakar Sadique Baba who promised to intervene in the matter for possible solution”.
The eleven affected State Constituencies are: Toro/Jama’a and Lame State Constituency in Toro Local Government; Burra State Constituency in Ningi Local Government; Ganjuwa East State Constituency in Ganjuwa LGA and Giade State Constituency in Giade LGA.
