One of the aspirants under the platform of the All Progressives Congress, APC, for Egbeda State Constituency Seat at the Oyo State House of Assembly, Alhaji Sadare Wasiu Olawale has petitioned the Appeal Panel committee.
Sadare in his letter said election didn’t hold in Egbeda despite the availability of all aspirants and delegates at the venue of the congress.
He urged the party to address the issue to allow the good people of the constituency to have a candidate.
It reads: “I write to call your attention to the inability of our great Party to conduct the mandatory Party Primary expected to produce a Candidate for Egbeda State Constituency in the Oyo State House of Assembly from a list of Six (06) aspirants in relation to the 2023 general election.
“I am one of the six eligible Aspirants contesting the seat of Egbeda State Constituency in the Oyo State House of Assembly under the Platform of our great Party- All Progressives Congress (APC). I paid for, obtained and submitted both the Expression of Interest and Nomination Forms for the Post I am seeking and I also underwent the Screening Exercise where I was duly cleared to participate in the Party Primary in question. My Form Number is: 3529.
“Pointedly, we had looked forward to the Thursday 26th of May, 2022 date announced by APC Headquarters for the conduct of party primaries to pick candidates for the State House of Assembly seats across the country. Our local chapter was asked to mobilize concerned Party faithful to the Secretariat of APC in Egbeda Local Government located at Opposite Toun Memorial Hospital along new Ife Road, Ibadan and this we did diligently even as we expected the timely release of the Delegate List which is required for the conduct of the desired voting exercise.
“To my chagrin, there was nobody on ground to either furnish us with the needed information on the Delegate List or how the State House of Assembly primary would be carried out. The Senator Tokunbo Afikuyomi-led Committee, we reliably gathered, only had the mandate to conduct Oyo APC Gubernatorial Primary while another Committee (whose members’ identities remain unknown) was responsible for the conduct of House of Assembly Aspirant Primary. Up till this present moment, nobody can say anything about the arrangement for the conduct of the Exercise particularly in Egbeda State Constituency and other 31 Constituencies across Oyo State.
“Sir, I am using this medium to establish the fact that a good number of Leaders, Chieftains and members as well as all the Six House of Assembly aspirants from Egbeda State Constituency arrived the official Venue of the anticipated Party Primary yesterday (26/05/2022) 8am and we all left 7pm. Throughout the 11 hours of our stay, nobody showed up as either members of the Electoral Committee or Party Primary Committee from Abuja and as a result, we could not do anything relating to either Voting or Consensus. It was very disappointing.
“Meanwhile, all efforts made to obtain credible information as to why the Exercise could not hold due to the non-appearance of any relevant officials have not yielded any desired fruit. Our officials at the State Secretariat of the Party told us point blank that the National Headquarters was in charge and as a result, they could not offer any answer or clarification to our questions and enquiry. This development has opened the doorway to insinuations and rumours but we are trying to douse the tension. More so, we are now in the lurch even as pressure keep coming from aspirants and stakeholders who demand immediate explanations from us.
“My Prayer; In view of the fact that the timeframe set by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for all party primaries to be concluded is fast approaching, I humbly call on your Honourable Panel to urgently look into this matter with a view to calling the attention of the appropriate organ of the Party at the Centre to this ugly scenario and offer an advice on the need to conduct a free, fair and acceptable Primary for all the Six aspirants so that our Party would miss the golden opportunity to present a candidate for the all-important election in 2023.
“Kindly accept the assurance of my warmest regards. I thank you, sir”
