ONDO State Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa has been declared the winner of the All Progressive Congress (APC) Primary for the forthcoming November 16 governorship election.
The Primary committee chairman and Kogi State governor, Ahmed Ododo, declared him the primary election winner in the early hours of Monday, April 22.
By the declaration, he is now the party’s candidate in the coming governorship election in the state.
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The governor gathered 48,569 votes, while fellow contender Mayowa Akinfolarin polled 15,343, and Olusola Oke came third with 14,865 votes.
According to Ododo, the electoral process went” smoothly”, with little skirmishes recorded.
Aiyedatiwa won 16 of the 18 LGA, losing out on Ilaje LGA to Oke.
The primary, which took place on Saturday, April 20, saw several contestants allege the elections didn’t take place anywhere.
In addition, some party supporters staged protests in Akure’s streets, calling for Ododo to be removed as the committee’s chair and the exercise to be cancelled.
The protesters brought their grievances to the APC state secretariat in Akure, where they claimed that there had been anomalies in how the 203 state ward primaries had been conducted.
They called the procedure a “daylight robbery” and pleaded with the APC national leadership to prevent the state from becoming entangled in a conflict.
According to the ruling APC, 171,922 members from the 203 wards of the state’s 18 local government areas participated in the Primary.
Ododo, who chaired the organising committee, declared the election inconclusive late on Saturday.
Ododo noted that the exercise would continue on Sunday, April 21, especially in Okitipupa, where violence by rival supporters within the party disrupted the process.
The ICIR reported that rival supporters of two party aspirants stirred up violence on Saturday at Ward 1, Stella Maris College, Okitipupa.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), the violence between two groups of supporters disrupted the voting process, leaving voters who had gathered at the ward scampering for safety even before the accreditation process began.
Eyewitnesses also told NAN that a party agent had arrived on the scene, snatched accreditation documents, and run away, leading to the unrest in the area.
Other irregularities during the process also led some aspirants to call for the exercise’s cancellation.
They alleged that the APC Electoral Committee, led by Kogi state Ododo, was not transparent and asked the party’s leadership to replace the committee chairman immediately.
The Ondo state governorship election is scheduled for November 2024.
A reporter with the ICIR
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