PDP Kicks As APC Plans Primary To Replace Audu

The All Progressives Congress has said it is preparing for a
fresh governorship primary in Kogi State to elect a candidate, who will replace
its candidate in the November 21 poll in the state, Prince Abubakar Audu, who
died on Sunday.

The new APC candidate will participate in the supplementary
governorship election in the state, which the Independent National Electoral
Commission has fixed for December 5.

Audu died on Sunday shortly after INEC declared the
Saturday’s governorship poll inconclusive.

In the Saturday election, the APC candidate had polled
240,867 votes, 41,353 votes higher than the Peoples Democratic Party candidate
and incumbent state governor, Capt. Idris Wada (retd.), who scored 199,514
votes.

The National Chairman of the APC, Chief John Odigie- Oyegun,
said this in Abuja on Tuesday while addressing the press after an emergency
meeting of the party’s National Working Committee.

Odigie-Oyegun said, “As a party, we are going to proceed
with the process of organising a primary to produce a substitute candidate for
the late Prince Abubakar Audu.”

Reacting to the pronouncement of the Attorney General of the
Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), who said the party
could produce a replacement for Audu in the rerun, the APC chairman stated, “It
is in the public space already. The chief law officer of the Republic has made
his views known as to how things should develop from this stage on.

“He has made a pronouncement to the effect that all that is
required is for the APC to go through the process of providing a replacement
for our late candidate.   

“INEC is obviously in agreement with the position of the AGF
because we have already received a letter from it, formally asking us to find a
replacement for the vacancy created by the passing of Prince Abubakar Audu;
that is what we are going to engage in.”

Odigie-Oyegun added, “We’ve only just got notification
today; we are going to go into an emergency session to fix a date for the
primary.

“Even the nature of the primary and the rest of it, we will
do in the next few hours; we are not talking of days because even the
supplementary election, we are told, INEC has fixed for December 5.’’

According to him, INEC has yet to communicate to the APC how
it arrived at the conclusion that the election was inconclusive and whether or
not the outstanding number of votes was that of registered voters or voters who
have their PVCs.

Odigie-Oyegun said, “INEC has made a pronouncement that the
election was inconclusive. But as of this moment, we are still to get anything
in writing from INEC, specifying the details of the polling units that were
involved and a clear definition as to whether it is referring to registered
voters or voters with PVCs; these are matter of details.”

Meanwhile, INEC has asked the APC to replace its Kogi State
governorship candidate, Audu, who died on Sunday.

Opinions have been divided on how INEC and the APC will fill
the vacuum created by Audu’s death, especially coming at a time when the
election had yet to be concluded.

The commission, however, in a statement after a meeting of
its management in Abuja on Tuesday, said the APC should produce a fresh
candidate to replace Audu.

It also fixed December 5 for the conduct of the
supplementary election in the 91 polling units spread across 19 of the 21 local
government areas of the state where election could not hold on Saturday.

INEC, in the statement by its Secretary, Mrs. Augusta
Ogakwu, stated that the commission had decided to conclude the process and to
allow the APC to produce a replacement for the late Audu.

The commission added, “On the November 23, 2015, the All
Progressives Congress notified the commission of the death of its governorship
candidate in the election, Prince Abubakar Audu.

“The commission has, after due consideration of the
circumstances, decided as follows:

“To conclude the process by conducting election in the 91
affected polling units as announced by the Returning Officer.

“To allow the APC to fill the vacancy created by the death
of its candidate.

“To conduct the supplementary election on December 5, 2015.

“Accordingly, notice is hereby given to all the 22 political
parties participating in the Kogi governorship election that supplementary
election in the 91 affected polling units shall hold on December 5, 2015.”

The INEC statement coincided with the pronouncement of
Malami, the AGF, who said on Tuesday that the Electoral Act and the 1999
Constitution already provided for a situation that had taken place in Kogi.

Malami, who said the supplementary election had to be
conducted, spoke in Abuja at a seminar organised by the Nigerian Law Reform
Commission on the reform of the National Environmental Standards and Regulation
Enforcement Agency (Establishment) Act.

He said by virtue of the provisions of Section 221 of the
Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended), the votes
cast were for the political party and by Section 33 of the Electoral Act 2010,
the political party had the right to substitute its candidate in case of death.

The PDP has, however, asked the AGF to immediately resign
from office over his position on the inconclusive governorship election in Kogi
State.

The former ruling party also called on INEC chairman, Prof.
Mahmood Yakubu, to resign from office for what it described as his inability to
exert the autonomy of the commission in the face of the confusion created by
Audu’s death.

The party said the position of the minister compelled INEC
to arrive at what it described as an unconstitutional decision to allow the APC
to substitute its candidate for the proposed supplementary governorship
election.

PDP said this in its reaction to the decision of INEC to
allow the APC to replace Audu with a fresh candidate and also to fix December 5
for the conduct of the supplementary election.

A statement by the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP,
Chief Olisa Metuh, in Abuja on Tuesday, said the opposition party had summoned
an emergency national caucus meeting of the PDP to deliberate on the matter.

He said, “The party is shocked that INEC, a supposedly
independent electoral umpire, could allow itself to succumb to the antics of
the APC by following the unlawful directive of an obviously partisan AGF to
substitute a candidate in the middle of the ballot process.

“We are all aware that the two legal documents guiding INEC
in the conduct of elections – the Constitution and the Electoral Act – have
provisions for electoral exigencies as well as empower the electoral body to
fully take responsibility for any of its actions or inaction without undue
interference from any quarters whatsoever.

“We are therefore at a loss as to which sections of these
two relevant laws INEC and the AGF relied on in arriving at their bizarre
decision to substitute a dead candidate in an ongoing election even after the
timeline for such has elapsed under all the rules.

“INEC, as a statutory body, has the full complements of
technical hands in its legal department to advise it appropriately and we
wonder why it had to wait for directives from the AGF, an external party, if
not for partisan and subjective interest.”

Metuh added that the PDP had “rejected in its entirety this
brazen move by the APC and INEC to circumvent the laws and ambush the yet-to-be
concluded election by introducing a practice that is completely alien to the
constitution and the electoral act.’’

He added, “The clear implication of this action of the AGF
and INEC is that the APC would be fielding two different governorship
candidates in the ongoing Kogi election, meaning that INEC would be
transferring votes cast for the late Prince Abubakar Audu to another candidate,
scenarios that have no place in the constitution of the land.”

Metuh alleged that INEC under the leadership of Yakubu had shown
itself as partisan, morally bankrupt and obviously incapable of conducting a
credible election within the ambit of the laws.

He said the PDP was demanding the immediate resignation of
the INEC chairman, alleging further that the nation’s democracy could not
afford to be left in the hands of an electoral umpire that he believed could
not exert its independence and the sanctity of the electoral process.

Punch