By Omeiza Ajayi

Ahead of the June governorship primaries in Edo State the various tendencies in the party are positioning themselves to gain advantage through different schemes. The alleged plot to alter the delegates list is a raging issue

For years, Nigeria has had to grapple with the menace of ghost workers whose presence in a nation’s payroll had often made nonsense of every effort to reduce recurrent expenditure in favour of capital expenditure.

However, with the decision of former President Goodluck Jonathan to introduce the Integrated Personnel Payment and Information System IPPIS, many of those ghost workers have been uncovered and more continue to be found out. Only recently, the Federal Government also announced that it uncovered over 23, 000 of such ghosts.

Oyegun-Oshiomhole

Interestingly, the incidence of ghosts is not peculiar to the public service alone, as politicians have now taken it to another dimension.

Remarkably, before the advent of the smart card readers and Permanent Voter Cards, PVCs the presence of ghosts during elections was a raging phenomenon in Nigeria. Those ghost voters, usually sent by their political ancestors from the spirit realm almost even in some cases far exceeded both the total number of voters that were accredited and or registered.

The forthcoming gubernatorial election in Edo state has thrown up another issue – Ghost delegates. But before then, there was a precursor of the ghost phenomenon in neighbouring Delta State.

In Delta, officials of the All Progressives Congress APC, in the aftermath of the   primaries ahead of the 2015 general elections were widely reported to have declared one of its candidates dead.

The APC reportedly substituted Christopher Anirah as its candidate for the Okpe/Sapele/Uvwie Federal Constituency election into the House of Representatives by claiming he was dead.

In his stead, the party listed Gibson Akporehe as its new candidate for the election.

Party officials, armed with several documents that were later acknowledged by the party to be fake – including death certificate and supposed confirmation of same by the family – had allegedly convinced the Independent National Electoral Commission to delete Mr. Anirah’s name.

The “deceased” when he resurfaced,   petitioned the police and asked for the arrest of all those involved in “killing” him. The issue is still subsisting as a moral deficit to the party in Delta State.

The situation, in Edo State, however, is raising, even more, concern according to party insiders, especially given that its national chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun hails from the state.
Edo’s list of controversy

The bone of contention is that a section of the party in the state believes that there is a surreptitious plot to alter the authentic delegates’ list which is expected to be used in the election of the party’s governorship candidate for the September 2016 election.

The suspicion has led to growing discontent among some stakeholders of the APC in the state over plans by the party to substitute the list ahead of the gubernatorial primary elections slated for June. Indeed, multiple sources in the party claim that party officials from the state presented a list of about 970 names said to be delegates elected after the membership registration exercise that followed the advent of the party who they claimed had either died or had left the party.

The sources alleged that that was, however, a decoy as it was a way of projecting a favoured aspirant, as those pencilled down for replacement on the delegate list were mainly delegates who the state leadership of the party believe they cannot control.

“The plan is to make the National Working Committee NWC of the party to strike out such names so that they can be replaced with people who are malleable to a certain aspirant said to enjoy the blessing of the party establishment in the state,” a gubernatorial aspirant who pleaded anonymity for fear of political victimization told Saturday Vanguard.

“Yes it is true that some delegates have left the party or have died, but it is by no way near the 970 that is being claimed,” another one of the aspirants said.

Another aspirant told Saturday Vanguard that the plot would not work, for reasons he said borders on the determination of the Chief Odigie-Oyegun to ensure the sanctity of the process.

The aspirant, however, said anyone pushing the plot must be ready to announce to the whole world the names and other particulars of the dead delegates.

“They must show us the death certificates of the people whose names are on that list. They must also publish their names in some national dailies.

“During the primaries, we are not going to allow people with government identity cards or just anyone to vote. We shall insist that delegates must come out with their international passports or driver’s license before they can be accredited to participate,” he vowed.

At a meeting of the party leadership and the aspirants few weeks ago, Odigie-Oyegun was said to have assured them on the sanctity of the delegates’ list, asserting that it would not be tampered with.

“He told us that if the list was not tampered with in Bayelsa or Kogi that why should we tamper with the list in Edo State,” one of the aspirants present at the meeting told Saturday Vanguard.

APC reacts, dismisses claims of substitution

The party has however dismissed the allegations that it plans to doctor its list of delegates. It also said it was not working for any “anointed” aspirant or set out to do the bidding of the governor.

Its Vice-Chairman, South-South, Mr Hilliard Ettah, denied the allegation alongside the National Organising Secretary of the party, Senator Osita Izunaso, at a stakeholders meeting with governorship aspirants of the party and its leaders.

They also condemned the seeming attack on Governor Oshiomhole by some of the aspirants, who accused him of backing the aspiration of Mr Godwin Obaseki, informing them that as a leader of the party, the governor deserves the right to have his preference for an aspirant but that the party will ensure that due process was followed in the conduct of the primaries.

At the meeting which was attended by Mr Oshiomhole, his deputy, Dr Pius Odubu, who is also one of the aspirants, Hon. Blessing Agbomhere, Gen. Charles Airhiavbere, Engr. Chris Ogienwonyi, Osarodion Ogie, Godwin Obaseki and Peter Esele, among others, Mr Ettah commended Gov. Oshiomhole’s developmental strides in the state.

He reminded the leaders that Edo remains the only APC state in the South-South and that the leadership of the party has no intention of losing it to the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, as he appealed for peaceful campaign, assuring that while the party will provide a level playing ground, the aspirants too must support the party no matter who wins the primaries.

“And let me also say that nobody is changing the delegate list. Unlike some parties where they always elect their delegates prior to every primary, the list of APC delegates is already known by everybody because they have been there for four years,” he said.

Speaking at the parley, Hon. Agbomhere pledged the readiness of the aspirants to work harmoniously in the interest of the party.

He said he does not believe that the state executives in concert with the governor would want to alter the delegate list, saying the governor as the father of the party has the onerous task create a level-playing ground and also ensure the success of the party at the polls.