By Peter Duru, Makurdi

Benue state All Progressives Congress, APC, governorship aspirant, Senator Barnabas Gemade has rejected last Friday’s primary election result in the state.

The primary election was won by the suspended Revd. Fr. Hyacinth Alia who polled a total of 536,807 votes.

Rejecting the outcome of the exercise in a statement issued Sunday on the verified Facebook page of his Media aide, Solo Dzuah, the former National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, described the election as a sham.

Part of statement read, “recall that Thursday, May 26, 2022 Senator Gemade cautioned the Benue state chapter of the APC of the risk of not producing a candidate for the 2023 governorship elections by jettisoning the indirect mode of primaries as issued by the National Working Committee, NWC, of the party and adopting the Direct mode on the day of the scheduled primaries which was Thursday, May 26, 2022.

“It’s regrettable that inspite of the patriotic caution as a faithful party man who wishes the party well, the APC 2022 governorship primary election committee headed by Dr. Peter Ojie went ahead to conduct what can best be described as a sham primary election that has produced a bogus result.

“In the said primaries which commenced on Friday May 27, 2022 and which results were announced on May 28, 2022, Sen. Gemade observed that there were no guidelines issued for the primaries.

“There were no party membership registers at any of the ward venues. The electoral officers purportedly sat by the party secretariat, never moved to any of the venues throughout the state, party members who gathered there, gathered in vain.

“The so called results announced on Saturday May 28, 2022 were simply fabricated, and allocated to aspirants by some election panel members and state executive committee members.

“Besides the above, the conduct of the primaries outside the stipulated schedule of the NWC timetable and the Direct mode was no longer available to the party. The conduct of the said primaries is therefore, a violation of the Electoral Act as well as INEC guidelines for the conduct of the 2023 elections.

“Therefore, Senator Gemade hereby rejects in totality the sham called Direct Primaries for selecting a candidate for the party in Benue state.”

The statement added that “the primitive allocation of votes to aspirants for the purpose of disgracing them before Benue populace is a very shameful act of indiscretion, and anyone who seeks to disgrace their esteemed gubernatorial aspirants actually ends up disgracing themselves before the general public.”