The Kogi East stakeholders under the auspices of Abubakar Audu and James Faleke Political Structure have called on the APC leadership to ensure a level playing ground for the state’s governorship aspirants in its forthcoming governorship primary.
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Mr. Emmanuel Ocheja, the spokesperson of the stakeholders, made the call while speaking with newsmen at the party’s National Secretariat on Tuesday in Abuja, saying the primary should be free, fair, and transparent.
Ocheja, who said the stakeholders had submitted a petition to the party’s National Working Committee (NWC), however, alleged that the delegates list for the April 14 Kogi governorship primary had been adulterated.
He also claimed that the list made available to the stakeholders was populated by names of cronies of the State Government.
This, he said, comprised names of civil servants, government appointees, Local Government employees, and even members of opposition parties.
He said the stakeholders would only participate in the Kogi governorship primary if the party’s national leadership reviewed and adopted a direct mode of primary.
“We are close to the date for the conduct of the primaries, but the situation already indicated by the action of the state authority is faulty.
“We have the opportunity to go through the list of delegates forwarded to the national headquarters here.
“And we have identified names of civil servants, Local Government officials, and in some places, we even have opposition party members like people that voted for Labour Party the other time.
“The major reason we are here is that the list was not properly constituted to begin with, even the method of the compilation was faulty by the rules and regulations of the party,” he said.
According to Ocheja, the list was written without due consultation as the party’s elders and leaders in Kogi were not carried along.
He said the delegates list was wrongly combined because civil servants were not politicians.
Ocheja also demanded the display of the Ward register of members in line with the party’s Constitution so that party members could identify their names.
He said this would stop the emergence of strange Ward registers.
The Kogi governorship election is slated for November 11 by INEC.