Kogi Guber election: Observers group commends Kogi APC over free, fair primary election.
IDRIS AHMED, LOKOJA.
The National Independent Democratic Observers (NIDO), a non governmental organization, has commended the All Progressives Congress (APC), for conducting a free, fair and credible governorship primary election in Kogi State.
National Coordinator of NIDO Comrade Habbey Oladejo in a preliminary report made available to Journalists in Lokoja on Thursday, revealed that Alhaji Usman Ahmed Ododo overwhelmingly won the majority votes cast by the party members that participated in the election.
Oladepo stated that from the reports by its observer team on the field , shows that Alh. Usman Ododo scored the highest votes among the contestants after the final collaboration of the results at the state secretariat of the All Progressives Congress in Lokoja.
“NIDO as a non-profit, non-governmental and non-affiliated Organization that has been part of election monitoring across the Country, including monitoring parties candidate selection processes, with the aim of ensuring Democratic tenets permeates the nooks and crannies of the society.
“We in conjunction with other likemind organisations carried out comprehensive, independent observation and monitoring of the primary election in each of the twenty one local government areas of Kogi State.
“While the comprehensive report of our observations from the Kogi APC Gubernatorial primaries is almost 90 percent ready and due for public presentation, this preliminary release suffices to set the record straight, owing to numerous reports flying across the media space on the primaries,” the report stated.
The Coordinator therefore emphasized that the Kogi APC Primaries which produced Alh. Usman Ododo as the party’s gubernatorial flag-bearer of the party was credible, transparent and largely a true reflection of the party members’ wishes across the 21 local government area of the state.
“This is without prejudices to the avoidable lapses which are mainly logistic shortcomings on the part of the party, inadequate information dissemination among others.
“While protest and seeking redress is a constitutionally guaranteed right of all aggrieved members, we want to enjoin politicians and their agents to stop stamping truth on its head, when events fail to go their way.
“Truth and fact must never be sacrificed on the altar of group, sectional or parochial interest. Truth is colourless and it needs no witness to validate it.
“Our organisation has no interest whatsoever in all the 18 aspirants, our sole interest is nothing, but deepening democratic tenets, sustain observed laudable exercises and knock as might be appropriate any anti-democratic leanings” he further explained.
