- Aspirants accuse Melaye of hijacking election materials
The All Progressives Congress (APC) House of Assembly primary in Kogi State slated for Thursday was marred with irregularities as affected aspirants are threatening to defect to another party if the leadership of the party fails to address the situation.
Sunday Mirror learnt that the primary was marred with allegation of diversion of election materials and doctoring of the delegates list for the purpose of election.
One of the aspirants, Honourable Oluyori Afolabi, who addressed journalists yesterday on behalf of two other aspirants, Hon. B Adimula and Hon. Funsho Olumoko, alleged that the primary election materials for the Ijumu Local Government area were hijacked and diverted to a private house by the former House of Representatives member, Honourable Dino Melaye, who is a senatorial aspirant in the area.
“We were waiting at the venue of election with all the delegates till 5pm on the day for the election materials. But we when we called the person sent (treasurer of the party in the council) to collect the materials from the state secretariat, he told us that the materials have been hijacked by Dino Melaye who diverted the materials to a private residence to favour his aspirant,” he said.
He further stressed that there was no primary election in the Ijumu Local Government area and that whatever name that is presented to the party should not be accepted as it did not emanate from the primary.
Afolabi however called on the party secretariat to reschedule another primary where the right candidate would emerge in the interest of the party.
However efforts to speak with Melaye to react to allegation of hijack and diversion of election materials proved abortive as several calls and text messages put across to his phone was not answered.
Meanwhile, the primary for Lokoja 1 constituency which took place at the Amusement park in Lokoja ended in chaos at about few minute to 7pm due to the crisis emanating from tampering with the delegates list.
All efforts by Hon. Buba Jibril representing Lokoja/Koto Federal constituency to call for truce was not successful until two of the aspirants said the alleged doctored list should not be used for voting.
By 6pm when the returning officer was calling delegates for the primary election, some hoodlums bounced on the gate, forced it open and began to chant war songs, a development that compelled the security operatives to fire tear gas at the venue and everyone scampered for safety.
