Governorship/State assembly elections: INEC’s final list excludes APC candidates in Zamfara, Rivers; We will field candidates – APC, Yari

Candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Zamfara and Rivers states are not on the final list released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for the governorship and House of Assembly elections, Daily Trust reports.
INEC had on Wednesday night given reasons for excluding Zamfara APC candidates for the March 2 governorship and state assembly elections slated to hold in 29 of the 36 states of the federation.

The commission’s National Commissioner and Chairman Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, said the commission had met and approved the final list of candidates for the governorship, state assembly and FCT Area Council elections.
“On the whole, there are 1, 066 candidates for the governorship elections, 14, 583 for the state assembly elections and 806 for the FCT Area Council elections broken down into 105 chairmanship candidates and 701 councillorship candidates,” Okoye said.

On the controversy surrounding the Zamfara APC primaries, Okoye said the commission noted that there were two court judgements on the matter – one from a State High Court in Gusau and the other from a Federal High Court in Abuja.

“The former judgement (Zamfara High Court) clearly said that the APC conducted primaries in Zamfara State, contrary to the position of the commission. On the other hand, the Federal High Court in Abuja ruled that the party did not conduct valid primaries and therefore is ineligible to field candidates for the elections.

“The commission would like to reaffirm its commitment to obeying all court judgments, even when it disagrees with them. However, these are clearly two contradictory judgments delivered by two courts of coordinate jurisdiction on the same day.

“Consequently, the commission has decided to maintain its original position that the party in question did not conduct primaries and therefore, in line with Section 87 of the Electoral Act 20l0 (as amended), is not eligible to field candidates for the National Assembly, Governorship and State Assembly elections in Zamfara State,” he said.

On Rivers, a Federal High Court in Port Harcourt had nullified the direct and indirect primaries conducted by the two factions of the APC in the state.

The names of APC candidates were missing from the list pasted by the electoral body.

The court presided over by Justice Kolawole Omotosho said both primaries were not conducted according to the law and went ahead to restrain INEC from recognising Tonye Cole and Magnus Abe as APC governorship candidates in the general elections.

Senator Abe was declared the winner of a direct governorship primary conducted by a faction of the party in 2018 after polling 144, 929 votes.

But Cole emerged the winner of an indirect primary held by another faction with 3,329 votes.

Following the rulings, the Resident Electoral Commissioner in Rivers, Obo Effanga, insisted that the electoral umpire would always obey court injunctions.

 But the APC has promised to use all legal means to ensure that it fields candidates for the coming elections in Zamfara and Rivers State.

The APC National Publicity Secretary, Malam Lanre Issa-Onilu, said this while fielding questions from journalists yesterday in Abuja following the release of INEC’s list.

Daily Trust