2027 poll: As APC leads ‘hoarding’ primary candidates’ lists
By Ehichioya Ezomon
Two hidden facts emerged from the Wednesday, June 10, 2026, explanation by the spokesman of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Osa Director, on why the political parties, weeks after the legislative primaries held in May 2026, didn’t publish the lists of candidates that scaled the ballots: Those who won have been notified; and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) leads in no-disclosure of the winners.
On whether the NDC would publish the names of its successful candidates, Mr Director said: “It is not compulsory for you to publish a list of candidates. What the (1999) Constitution (of Nigeria) expects you to do by the guidelines of the Electoral Act (2026) is to send your list to INEC (Independent National Electoral Commission). And we have done so.
“Those who were victorious were also contacted and given nomination forms to fill. That’s all. Did you see the APC publish the names of their candidates in any major newspaper? The key thing is to send it to INEC, and candidates will be contacted, which we are already doing,” The Punch reported on June 10, 2026.
The NDC national leader and former Bayelsa Governor, Sen. Seriake Dickson (NDC, Bayelsa West), seems to align himself with the position of the party spokesman, dismissing reports on social media that winners had emerged from the party primaries.
In a post on his X handle on Thursday, June 11, 2026, Dickson said: “No party has announced any set of winners from its primaries, and neither has the NDC. The public should disregard any such claims in circulation, especially on social media, and await the party’s formal submissions through the appropriate channels.”
Similarly earlier in the past week, Senate President Godswill Akpabio, at the inauguration of the APC National Campaign Council for the Ekiti State Governorship Election holding on Saturday, June 20, 2026, said senators were “getting hypertensive” over the delayed release of the official results of the APC primary.
Appealing to the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party to “carry the National Assembly lawmakers along” in the final list to be submitted to INEC, Akpabio said: “Some of my people (Senators) are having hypertension. So, they are really coming down with hypertension. I am pleading, with the party, that when they bring out their final list, they need to show that they are carrying all of us along.”
As of Saturday, June 13, 2026, the APC – and the other 21 parties angling for control of power across Nigeria – still hoarded the list of candidates that’ll fly its flags at the National and State Houses of Assembly elections on January 16 and February 6, 2027, accordingly.
There’s a list in circulation that the APC disclaims, but which may not materially be different from the party’s list, when finally released, because the results were declared in the states during the direct primaries conducted from May 16 to May 21, 2026.
From the purported candidates’ list, out of the 36 States and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, only Bauchi, Nasarawa, Oyo and Taraba have one outstanding senatorial slot each to fill – the reason being that the districts “are either pending, inconclusive, or yet to conduct APC primaries due to internal disputes, zoning disagreements, logistical challenges, and postponements,” the Radarr News reports.
While the “denied” list is somehow a welcome relief to many of the “successful” APC candidates, who weren’t/aren’t sure of their positions due to reported intrigues at the party national headquarters; for the “defeated” aspirants, allegedly schemed out of the primaries, tension and anxiety continue, as their hopes for elective positions may’ve been dashed in the APC that’s faced defections since the primaries.
The party has lost to the opposition parties many national and state assembly members, who “failed” the primaries. It’s almost a daily cross-carpeting at the plenaries of the Senate and House of Representatives in the National Assembly (NASS) in Abuja.
The opposition African Democratic Congress (ADC), itself also imploding, had predicted an “exodus” of aggrieved aspirants from the APC over alleged manipulation of its primaries. True to that prediction, the defections began even as voting, under “Option A4” system of voters queuing behind the posters of their preferred aspirants, was ongoing – indicative of the scale and extent of the alleged rigging by party vested interests.
In the states, pressure mounts among the primary losers to remain in the APC as “loyal members” and work for the successful candidates, or as “disloyal members” waiting to sabotage the party from within; or decamp to opposition parties that can grant them waivers and automatic tickets via substitution of candidates.
In Edo State, the alleged APC “list” of senatorial candidates confirms the three names bandied as “anointed” or “imposed” prior to the May 18, 2026, primary, viz: Sen. Adams Oshiomhole (APC, Edo North), Sen. Joseph Ikpea (APC, Edo Central), and Hon. Omoregie Ogbeide-Ihama (APC, Edo South).
The fiercest agitation over the primary comes from supporters of two-time governorship candidate, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, who accused Governor Monday Okpebholo and the state APC chapter of “imposition,” on Edo South, of Ogbeide-Ihama, who defected from the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) based on alleged agreement by Okpebholo and the APC to “compensate” the external forces” that reportedly helped Okpebholo to the governorship in 2024.
The “external influence” includes President Bola Ahmed Tinubu as leader of the APC, and former Rivers Governor and Minister of the Federal Capit+2348033078357
Ehichioya Ezomon
( _Good day, Editor/Admin. Below copy for publication from Monday, June 22, 2026. Thanks and God Bless. Ezomon_ .)
*As Idumabi community confronts ‘good’ and ‘bad’ news from Okpebholo’s govt*
By *Ehichioya Ezomon*
Edo State Governor Monday Okpebholo assumed office in November 2024. Since then, the Idumabi Community of Irrua Kingdom in Esan Central Local Government Area of Edo Central Senatorial District of Esanland has received his administration’s attention in terms of provision of and/or promise to provide amenities for the people.
Already installed by the government in the community are solar-powered street lights (complemented by those provided by private indigenes) on virtually all the roads/streets, such that Idumabi looks like a “small London” at night, helping to improve visibility and security. There’s a functional 200kva transformer serving two roads and their avenues.
There’s a firm commitment by the government to replace the faulty 500kva transformer (the people spent millions to repair regularly) that serves most parts of the community that’s lately without power supply for months.
(With the influx of strangers, who buy up and erect property in vacant plots – partly due to the siting of Mudiame University, Irrua (MUI), owned by a son-of-the-soil, Prof. Sunny Eboh Eromosele – the demand and need for more power supply and additional transformers have increased in the community.)
While employments have been offered to several indigenes, the government also has on its card for Idumabi a proposed Health Centre, for which a parcel of land has been donated. For these, the communiypeople are grateful to Governor Okpebholo and his administration!
To the nexus of this article. First came the good news. Second the fear and anxiety. Third the bad news that’s assailed the people, and blunted the initial cheering news that the presence of government was taking shape at Idumabi on Okpebholo’s watch.
The unsavoury news is that devastating consequences have come with government’s provision of amenities: disruption of ways of life, destruction of property and and a possible displacement of the people from their homesteads.
On the platform of Idumabi Development Association (IDA) worldwide, Idumabi people, home and abroad, were given the assurance by their leaders that the Sen. Okpebholo government would construct, tar and drainage the roads, to arrest the flood and erosion ravaging the community.
On April 27, 2026, the Lagos branch of IDA received the good news via a video posted to its WhatsApp page, with the voice-over in pidgin English relaying a bulldozer excavating the major road from the old Ekpoma-Irrua-Uromi-Ubiaja road (being expanded into a multi-lane highway by the Okpebholo administration).
The narrator’s words: “Na Idumabi road be dis. Dey wan tar am. Dey wan tar Idumabi road. And the road is very wide, very very wide, very wide. Dis is Idumabi junction; dey wan start to dey tar di road. As you can see, e go affect every house. Like dis one now, e go affect di house also. Not di main fence, very close to di fence. You see am (road), now e wide. Na so e dey go; e go reach dea.”
Joy and happiness masked the narrator’s voice: That Idumabi road(s) was receiving attention of Edo State government, as Okpebholo promised when he campaigned for Senate for Edo Central in 2023, the Governorship he won in September 2024, and after he took office in November 2024. The six main roads have been graded, awaiting actual construction and tarring in line with the governor’s promises.
But then came the contractor – handling channelisation of floodwater caused by the reconconstruction of the Ekpoma-Irrua-Uromi-Ubiaja road – digging a long, shallow open drainage that transverses the community, and will terminate at a massive burrow pit of 10 plots (1000x1000ft) of land behind inhabited buildings.
The possible threats posed by channelisation of the stormwater into Idumabi came up for serious discussions and debate at the IDA Annual General Meeting during the April 2026 Easter Convention in the community.
Most residents, who suffer from erosion and seasonal flooding, and others whose property and farmlands could be impacted by the floodwater channelisation, expressed worry that rather than alleviation, they would be subjected to further hardships.
The Meeting was told that when the contractor visited to inform about the drainage and burrow pit, the communitypeople registered their fears and anxiety: that without an underground drainage, the floodwater could overflow the banks, and affect property, farmlands and the landscape.
Truly, the worst has happened before their very eyes in a matter of weeks. The contractor, who didn’t show any proper reports of feasibility study and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) on the project, nor revert to the generality of Idumabi people, embarked on the drainage, and caused havoc in the community.
The open drainage has left compounds flooded; excavated sand block entrances to buildings; and some residents, unable to access their homes, have turned squatters in neighbours’ houses. This comes amid concerns over likely water-borne diseases and displacement if the government doesn’t intervene for urgent, remedial actions.
Doesn’t this man-created flooding throw up the grading of Idumabi roads as a decoy for the drainage the contractor knew would negatively impact the community? The scenario is akin to, “What the government has given with the right hand, the contractor has taken with the left hand!”
Which raises the poser: Was the Okpebholo government aware of the contractor’s ploy to wreak devastation at Idumabi community? Whatever, Governor Okpebholo should step in before his pledge to upgrade Idumabi roads is rubbished by the drainage contractor!
It’s not by choice or design – even the community’s forebears dating back centuries couldn’t have foreseen it in the thickly-forested lands of those era – that Idumabi situates on a low plane.
Over the decades, flooding and floodwater found home in the community, causing erosion that affected roads, the expansive Community Square and farmlands. This prompted repeated calls and appeals to past Edo governments for solutions, to no avail. So, no one or institution should take undue advantage of Idumabi’s precarious situation!
Mainly with the assistance of some of its sons and daughters, and funds raised via development levies, Idumabi community has maintained the six roads leading to it from the Ekpoma-Irrua-Uromi-Ubiaja road, Irrua-Opoji road, and the road from Idumabi to Oghagbo community.
The people are not against the government siting projects, and upgrading the roads in the community, which Okpebholo has favoured so far. However, on the channelisation project, the people have some reservations, which they condense into two suggestions/requests to the government.
Can’t the administration construct an underground pit(s) in the setback/right-of-way on the Ekpoma-Irrua-Uromi-Ubiaja road at the floodwater axis at Idumabo-Uwenuje-Eguare in Irrua, and channel it therein, to save Idumabi community from a disaster(s) foretold?
Though the comparison is far-fetched due to the disparity in the scale and scope of the projects – plus the non-existence of a river or stream at Idumabi community – the government has put in place measures to mitigate the environmental problems in the localities around the construction site of the “first-of-its-kind” Ramat Park Flyover Bridge at Ikpoba Hill, Aduwawa, in Benin City, Edo’s capital city.
A recent report by John Mayaki (Post-Digital Journalist and Media Communications Expert) “on the progress reports/photos on the flyover bridge” stated that the government has embarked on “channelisation of floodwater to the Ikpoba River, through an underground drainage system routed along Obaseki Street… expected to provide lasting relief to residents and road users who have suffered years of environmental degradation and disruption caused by flooding.”
Idumabi needs a similar underground drainage system to convey the volume of stormwater destined for the community. This will prevent refuse dump in an open drainage, and enhance free flow of water, and also disasters, such as residents, mostly children, falling into the drainage during heavy downpours, and swept into the open, flooded burrow pit.
The people are prepared to cooperate and collaborate with the government and the contractor(s) handling the project, to find a suitable site for a sustainable and durable solution to the stormwater problem, to avoid disruption, displacement and evacuation from their ancestral land.
Idumabi salutes and appreciates Governor Okpebholo’s administration as the first to show physical presence in the community since the 1963 creation of Midwestern Region (Mid-Western State), later renamed Bendel State in 1976 (during Nigeria’s restructuring from 12 states to 19 states), and Delta and Edo states in 1991 when Bendel was split.
In light of ongoing developments, they appeal to the government to ensure that the channelisation of stormwater, resulting from the reconstruction of the Ekpoma-Irrua-Uromi-Ubiaja road, does not adversely affect, and make worse the flooding and erosion problems at Idumabi.
This plea is with all sense of humility and responsibility, as the people’s fears and anxiety are premised on safeguarding their lives and livelihoods, and their land and future generations of the community.
The people hope and trust that the good-spirited and kind-hearted Okpebholo won’t associate with any design, overt or covert, to destroy Idumabi he’s favourably disposed to, but to continue to share in their aspirations to live in peace and harmony with their neighbours, and under a government that protects their lives and property. Let only good news flow and flourish in Idumabi Community!
• _Mr Ezomon, Journalist and Media Consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria. Can be reached on X, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp @EhichioyaEzomon. Tel: 08033078357_ .
