THE personal assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on new media, Bashir Ahmad, has rejected the outcome of primary election after losing the House of Representatives ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Ahmad failed to secure the APC ticket for the Gaya/Ajingi/Albasu Federal Constituency, Kano, in the primary election that was held on Friday, May 27, 2022.
He was defeated by the incumbent member, Abdullahi Gaya, with 109 to 16 votes.
Reacting to the development on Saturday via his verified Facebook handle, Ahmad argued that the voting process lacked credibility as both he and his agents were denied access to the venue.
“To the best of my knowledge, election at the primaries stage requires delegates to cast their votes and a winner emerges with the majority votes. It, therefore, implies that there could not have been any voting process that occurred considering majority of the delegates were neither allowed to vote nor even granted access to the venue.
“No document that supposedly validates the election was signed by my agents because they were also denied access to the voting area.
“On my arrival to the venue as an aspirant too, I was denied access to the voting area. My supporters who were around the premises for the primaries resisted the unjust treatment I was given and attempted insisting on my entrance into the voting area,” he said.
He explained that he later left the election premises for the safety of the majority delegates, his agents and his supporters.
“Like I have consistently been saying, my ambition is not worth anybody’s life or safety, so at that time, I believed the best action to take was to vacate the premises in order to douse the friction and for the safety of the majority delegates, my agents and my supporters who were being targeted by thugs,” he added.
He urged the leaders of the party to, as a matter of urgency, annul the election and conduct a fresh, free and fair election to save its reputation.
Nurudeen Akewushola is an investigative reporter and fact-checker with The ICIR. He believes courageous in-depth investigative reporting is the key to social justice, accountability and good governance in society. You can reach him via nyahaya@icirnigeria.org and @NurudeenAkewus1 on Twitter.