Protest Rocks APC Secretariat as Idahosa Threatens Lawsuits

Barely 24 hours after Senator Monday Okpebholo emerged as the winner of the All Progressives Congress governorship primary in Edo State, Dennis Idahosa, one of the 11 aspirants who lost out, marched to the party's national headquarters for justice.

Idahosa, who arrived at the party's office around 2.30pm with a horde of his supporters, described Thursday's re-run election as a'selection' instead of a 'electoral' process, as the party in power wanted everyone to believe.

The Edo federal lawmaker was one of three winners from the contentious first primary held on February 17, which ended up being inconclusive.

Governor Hope Uzodimma, the the then-chairman of the primary election committee, declared Idahosa the winner, while the re-election officer, Stanley Ugboaja, declared Okpebholo the winner.

Meanwhile, Ojo Babatunde, who claimed to represent the returning officers in all local governments, declared Anamero Dekeri the winner of the election.

The outcome of the shadow election sparked a public outcry, prompting the APC's National Working Committee to declare the poll inconclusive, paving way for last Thursday's re-run election, whereby Okpebholo was declared the winner.

Addressing reporters at the secretariat's primary entrance on Saturday, Idahosa threatened to take the APC to court if the party failed to fulfill his mandate.

The lawmaker, who told reporters the he had submitted a protest letter to the APC governorship Appeal Committee, additionally asked President Bola Tinubu to call the APC NWC to order.

He said, "I'm not here to cause trouble. I am a lawmaker, but the one thing we all want is justice. Today I might be a young man, but tomorrow it might be the children of NWC members. We must do the right thing; if we continue to do wrong as a nation, we are unlikely to progress.

"So I'm asking Mr. President to call the NWC to order. The elections were held on February 17th. What they did on the 22nd was simply select. I challenged one of the LGA returning officers to demonstrate me a photo of himself at the local government office where he compiled the results; he was just blabbing. There was nothing because I knew they were staying at the same hotel in Benin, where they had recorded all of the results.

"So, my fellow party members, I'm not here to cause trouble. I'm here merely to seek justice. I wrote to the appeal panel commitee yesterday, and I am confident that its members will do justice. I just want to get through the process after exhausting the party's dispute resolution mechanism. I will go further and seek justice in a court of law as I will not let this stand."