Agency Report/
Two parallel governorship primaries held by the All Progressives Congress (APC) on Wednesday in Ogun State have produced two governorship candidates.
The state chairman of the party, Chief Derin Adebiyi, declared the House of Representatives member, Adekunle Akinlade, as the winner of the primary conducted by the state, the electoral panel sent by the National Working Committee (NWC) declared oil mogul, Prince Dapo Abiodun as another the winner.
The two groups claimed they held the authentic primary as ordered by the NWC.
Muhammad Ndabawa, who led the NWC Electoral Committee members declared that Abiodun, who hails from Ogun East Senatorial District, scored 102,305 votes from the 236 wards across the 20 Local Governments to emerge the candidate.
According to Ndabawa, Jimi Lawal scored 51,153 votes, Abimbola Ashiru – 29,764, Senator Gbenga Kaka – 17,771, Abayomi Hounye – 9,110 votes and Adekunle Akinlade – 23, 443 votes.
Ndabawa said that the declaration of Abiodun as the winner “is subject to ratification by the National Working Committee of the party”.
He also said he was not aware of the exercise that produced Akinlade.
“Our Committee is the authentic body constituted by the NWC to conduct and supervise governorship primary in the state in line with the party guidelines and constitution,” Ndabawa said.
The Chairman of the party in the state, Chief Derin Adebiyi, who announced the alternative results at the party secretariat in Abeokuta also claimed that the direct primaries were conducted across the 236 wards of the state.
He added that the exercise was conducted through the open secret ballot system in accordance with the party guidelines on direct primaries.
According to him, six aspirants contested for the governorship position including Lawal, Hounye and the former state commissioner for Commerce and Industry, Mr Bimbo Ashiru.
Others are a former Deputy Governor of the state, Sen. Adegbenga Kaka, the Chairman of the Corporate Affairs Commission, Chief Dapo Abiodun and Akinlade who is representing Ipokia/Egbado-South Federal Constituency at the House of Representatives.
A breakdown of the result announced by Adebiyi on local government basis shows that Akinlade won in all the 20 council areas of the state. scoring a total of 190,987 votes.
Lawal came second with a total of 5, 046 votes while Abiodun came third with 3, 648 votes.
Ashiru scored 898, Kaka 833 and Hounye 208 votes to emerge fourth, fifth and sixth.
Adebiyi said that the primaries were supervised by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and security agencies.
The Chairman who described the national electoral committee of the party as being “compromised” said the committee was not in town to conduct the primaries.
He explained that the committee had continued to postpone the exercise which was originally scheduled to hold on Saturday.
Adebiyi said the party leadership is vested with the responsibility of overseeing the affairs of the party in the state.