16—SATURDAY Vanguard, JULY 13, 2019 Kogi: Coast clears for Bello as Ametuo group withdraws Court case By Omeiza Ajayi If the political atmosphere of Kogi state, especially with regards to the reelecti<strong>on</strong> prospects of Gov. Yahaya Bello of the ruling All Progressives C<strong>on</strong>gress APC had appeared hazy or fuzzy, last week’s decisi<strong>on</strong> of the Nati<strong>on</strong>al Working Committee NWC of the party to adopt indirect method for its forthcoming primaries appeared to have opened a <strong>new</strong> vista of hope for Nigeria’s youngest governor. Often regarded as the “C<strong>on</strong>fluence of Opportunities”, recent political developments in the state had made it appear more as a C<strong>on</strong>fluence of C<strong>on</strong>fusi<strong>on</strong> owing to the crisis in the ruling APC and the inability of the main oppositi<strong>on</strong> Peoples Democratic Party PDP to get its groove back and provide a formidable platform ahead of the November electi<strong>on</strong>s. As for the APC, the party had been broken into facti<strong>on</strong>s with the erstwhile state chairman, Hadi Ametuo and the current party chair, Abdullahi Bello leading different facti<strong>on</strong>s. While Gov. Bello aligned with the Abdullahi Bello group, the Hadi Ametuo group had the backing of some party stakeholders like Sen. Alex Kadiri and others some of who had defected to the PDP before the last general electi<strong>on</strong>s. In fact, at a point, Kogi West senator, Dino Melaye bel<strong>on</strong>ged to this latter group. APC NEC positi<strong>on</strong> <strong>on</strong> Primaries The APC C<strong>on</strong>stituti<strong>on</strong> provides for three modes of primaries viz; direct, indirect or c<strong>on</strong>sensus. On assumpti<strong>on</strong> of office, the Comrade Adams Oshiomhole-led NWC had listed c<strong>on</strong>diti<strong>on</strong>s for the choice of primary to be adopted in states for electi<strong>on</strong>s. This was announced after a meeting of the Nati<strong>on</strong>al Executive Council NEC of the party <strong>on</strong> August 30, 2018. The NEC had adopted the following positi<strong>on</strong>: “Primary electi<strong>on</strong>s into all elective offices shall be by Direct Primaries; NEC resolved to adopt Direct Primaries for the nominati<strong>on</strong> of the Presidential candidate and all other Primaries; The Party’s c<strong>on</strong>stituti<strong>on</strong> though provides for Indirect Electi<strong>on</strong> and C<strong>on</strong>sensus, however, the use of Indirect The governor advised those who are aggrieved with him to close ranks and join him to deliver the state to the APC during the governorship electi<strong>on</strong>s Primaries is c<strong>on</strong>diti<strong>on</strong>al and dependent <strong>on</strong> logistic impediments; peculiarities and need of a given State that makes it unable to use Direct Primaries. “The State Executive Committee SEC shall in c<strong>on</strong>sultati<strong>on</strong> with aspirants and other critical stakeholders of the Party in a given State forward for the c<strong>on</strong>siderati<strong>on</strong> and approval by the Nati<strong>on</strong>al Working Committee NWC, if Indirect Primaries is to be adopted. The adopted mode shall now be applied to all categories of the Party’s Primary Electi<strong>on</strong>s i.e. State Assembly, Senate, House of Representatives and for the Governorship Electi<strong>on</strong>s. “The request for Indirect Primaries must be signed by majority of the State Executive Committee and critical stakeholders in attendance at the meeting where such resoluti<strong>on</strong> is reached”. Chaotic Primaries, electoral losses Comrade Oshiomhole had recently come under increasing attacks for losing some APC states to the oppositi<strong>on</strong>, especially with the party’s resort to direct primaries despite the obvious shortcomings inherent in the process. The cases of Zamfara, Rivers and others have been listed as reas<strong>on</strong>s why direct primary is not feasible for the APC as presently c<strong>on</strong>stituted. For the APC, there is a clear lack of an authentic party membership register. After the merger in the lead up to the 2015 general electi<strong>on</strong>s, the party had claimed to have 12 milli<strong>on</strong> members having reportedly registered no fewer than 100 pers<strong>on</strong>s in each of the 120, 000 Polling Units of the Independent Nati<strong>on</strong>al Electoral Commissi<strong>on</strong> INEC. Then mid last year, it decided to embark <strong>on</strong> fresh registrati<strong>on</strong> of <strong>new</strong> members as well as revalidati<strong>on</strong> of old members, an exercise that saw its membership reportedly boosted to almost 16 milli<strong>on</strong>. The challenge has however been the inability of the states to come up with a clean copy of the membership register, without which direct primaries as canvassed by some aspirants cannot hold. INEC weighs in The Independent Nati<strong>on</strong>al Electoral Commissi<strong>on</strong> INEC has <strong>on</strong> its part outlined measures to be undertaken by political primaries to have a recognized primary electi<strong>on</strong>, am<strong>on</strong>g which is the usage of a valid voter register for such exercise. Chairman of the Commissi<strong>on</strong>, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu disclosed this recently in Abuja during a postelecti<strong>on</strong> review meeting with leaders of registered political parties in the country. According to him, the c<strong>on</strong>duct of party primaries and nominati<strong>on</strong> of candidates for the 2019 General Electi<strong>on</strong>s was indeed very acrim<strong>on</strong>ious resulting in a number of court cases <strong>on</strong> the participati<strong>on</strong> or otherwise of political parties and candidates in electi<strong>on</strong>s in many c<strong>on</strong>stituencies. Yakubu recalled his earlier disclosure that at the moment, there are 809 cases challenging the c<strong>on</strong>duct of primaries by political parties in regular courts across the country, explaining that the figure is more than the number of petiti<strong>on</strong>s challenging the c<strong>on</strong>duct of the main electi<strong>on</strong> currently before the Electi<strong>on</strong> Petiti<strong>on</strong> Tribunals nati<strong>on</strong>wide. “Where political parties opt for direct primaries, there should be proper register of members otherwise it will amount to c<strong>on</strong>ducting an electi<strong>on</strong> without the voters’ register”, he declared. Court case withdrawn At present, there are about 58 governorship aspirants in the APC in Kogi state out of which 20 of them had petiti<strong>on</strong>ed the party’s NWC, kicking <strong>again</strong>st indirect primary. While they argued that going with indirect primaries was like handing over the ticket to Gov. Bello <strong>on</strong> a platter, they cited a court case instituted by the Hadi Ametuo group as reas<strong>on</strong> why the indirect method cannot be used. They argued that there are two facti<strong>on</strong>s of the party and that the court is yet to determine which of the facti<strong>on</strong>s is valid, a development that makes it uncertain as to the choice of delegate list to be used for indirect primaries. Since the primaries would hold <strong>on</strong> August 29, the aggrieved aspirants argued that the process could be nullified with the court judgement slated for October 2. Interestingly, 37 governorship aspirants of the party have also petiti<strong>on</strong>ed the NWC, cauti<strong>on</strong>ing <strong>again</strong>st a “change of formula in the middle of the game”. The aspirants who were at the nati<strong>on</strong>al secretariat <strong>on</strong> Thursday to submit their petiti<strong>on</strong> in support of indirect primaries, urged the party hierarchy not to impose any aspirant <strong>on</strong> the people. Spokesman of the aspirants, Comrade Amade Gow<strong>on</strong> Edime said “it will take a lot of logistic arrangements to organize a direct primary for the over half a milli<strong>on</strong> members of the APC in the state”. On his part, the man who instituted the case ab initio has now announced its withdrawal. Alhaji Hadi Ametuo faulted other aspirants who had kicked <strong>again</strong>st the use of indirect method of primaries, accusing them of impers<strong>on</strong>ati<strong>on</strong>. Ametuo said as the erstwhile party chairman, he had pers<strong>on</strong>ally deposed to an affidavit and instituted a case <strong>again</strong>st the governor’s •Gov. Yahaya Bello recognized Alhaji Abdullahi Bello-led Kogi state APC, adding that he has withdrawn the case from court to allow for a landslide victory for the party in the coming electi<strong>on</strong>s. He said; “I am the immediate past state chairman of APC. I am a b<strong>on</strong>afide member of APC. I built the party in the state. I distanced myself when I felt that I and my people were not carried al<strong>on</strong>g. The former nati<strong>on</strong>al chairman initiated a lot of rec<strong>on</strong>ciliati<strong>on</strong> moves but there was no headway. Gov. Bello took it up<strong>on</strong> himself to initiate peace moves. We met him when he called us <strong>on</strong> June 26. I and my team met him and he said he is ready to rec<strong>on</strong>cile with us. The next day we met with the stakeholders of the party and explained our positi<strong>on</strong> to them. “I was the <strong>on</strong>e that took the party to court and I said what next after rec<strong>on</strong>ciliati<strong>on</strong>? So, I withdrew because I cannot destroy my own party. I single handedly went to the court to file the suit and depose to an affidavit. How can those who who did not initiate the case say the case is still in court?”, he queried. Gov. Bello <strong>on</strong> his part said it was criminal for any<strong>on</strong>e to have g<strong>on</strong>e to court to depose to an affidavit to c<strong>on</strong>tinue a case that had been withdrawn by the former party chairman. “Had Ametuo was the leader of his own group, I d<strong>on</strong>’t want to call it a facti<strong>on</strong> because there were <strong>never</strong> facti<strong>on</strong>s in Kogi APC. But his own group felt aggrieved that they were <strong>never</strong> carried al<strong>on</strong>g in the scheme of things. For us as a party to go into the electi<strong>on</strong>s and win overwhelmingly, we has to bring everybody <strong>on</strong> board. “The issue of Kogi state APC being in court has been withdrawn. Any body that is parading himself to say that there is a case in court, I will rather advise such pers<strong>on</strong> not to tow the path of criminality because you cannot depose to an affidavit in the absence of the right pers<strong>on</strong> who is supposed to do so. Kogi state is not known for criminality. APC is not known for criminality”, he added. The governor advised those who are aggrieved with him to close ranks and join him to deliver the state to the APC during the governorship electi<strong>on</strong>s. Despite assurances by the NWC to look into the petiti<strong>on</strong> as submitted by the 20 aggrieved aspirants, there is no full-proof guarantee that the body would reverse itself and go for direct primaries.
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