TELL Magazine

The last may not have been heard in the controversial Edo State All Progressives Congress, (APC) governorship primary election as the initially declared winner of the election, Dennis Idahosa, the member representing Ovia Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives is still laying claim to the party’s ticket in spite of the emergence of Monday Okpebholo as the APC’s flagbearer last Friday.

In a personally signed petition to the Edo State Gubernatorial Primary Election Appeal Committee titled “APC primary Election For Edo State”, Idahosa, who called for the setting aside of the repeated primary election of February 22, demanded that he be reinstated as the party’s candidate. 

Idahosa, was declared winner of the Saturday February 17, 2024, election with over 40,000 votes by the Governor Hope Uzodimma Primary Election Committee before the National Working Committee, NWC, of the ruling party declared it inconclusive because of petitions by nine other aspirants. Okpebholo was credited with over 12, 000 votes.

Idahosa however insisted that by congratulating him on his emergence, the national chairman of the party, Senator Abdullahi Ganduje, and the NWC, had acknowledged his victory.

Idahosa expressed surprise that despite the widely publicised congratulatory message by Ganduje, as well as that of Uzodimma on his X handle, (formerly Twitter) the party, on February 20, 2024, “a press statement surfaced indicating that the NWC considered a report and resolved that the Governorship Primary Election” has not been completed and has now fixed February 22, 2024, for the completion of the primary election process”.

The aggrieved Federal lawmaker said, “I find the said statement more unusual in the light of the reality that the report of the NWC Gubernatorial Primary Election Committee was emphatic and unequivocal that not only was the primary election Conclusive, but that I won same”.

Idahosa warned the party against the negative legal consequences of substituting his name.
According to him, “As you will appreciate, nomination of a governorship candidate is mandatorily by democratically conducted primary election where there are multiple aspirants seeking to fly the political party’s flag.

“The law does not make provision for multiple/substitute primary elections as communicated by the Press Release in the absence of the withdrawal or death of the winner of the primary election, neither does the law permit or anticipate any circumstance where the name of any person aside the winner of the primary election is submitted to INEC as the party’s candidate. Our party ought to be guided on the path of legality and avoid actions that can cause avoidable negative legal consequences for the party”.

Faulting the process that produced Okpebholo, Idahosa argued that “On 22nd February 2024, even though there was no outstanding process from the primary election of 17th February 2024 to be concluded, the Primary Election Committee, with the same members who had signed the earlier report except for H. E. Hope Uzodinma, were in Benin City. However, instead of indicating which part of the earlier primary election the Committee was to conclude, in the course of the day, it proceeded to conduct another primary election purportedly across all the Wards in Edo State.

“Surprisingly, it announced result that did not tally with the votes from the Wards obtained at any validly or duly conducted primary election and/or Local Government Areas. Consequently, I urge that the purported return of Senator Monday Okpebholo as the winner of the primary election be set aside while I am reinstated and/or declared the winner of the election”.