Three ward chairmen of the All Progressives Congress in the Ijebu North Local Government Area of Ogun State have protested their alleged replacement on the state’s delegate list.
They alleged that they won at the party congress held last June and had been declared winners in the presence of stakeholders, including officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission.
The chairmen, Sulaimon Bude of Ward 9, Banjo Adesegun of Ward 10, and Bola Lamina of Ward 11 claimed not to have been sworn in since their election on July 31, 2021.
They however raised the alarm that their names were allegedly expunged from the delegate list of the party in the state.
The chairmen while speaking with journalists in Abeokuta on Friday, said they had reported officially to the party and the state Governor, Dapo Abiodun by raising the alarm over the alleged existence of a fake delegate list in their wards.
They explained that they also wrote a petition to the INEC that supervised the party’s congress, Department of State Services and some leaders of the party in Ijebu-North constituency II.
The aggrieved chairmen, in their letters, obtained by our correspondent on Friday, called the attention of the governor and others to the alleged fake list reportedly submitted by another group in their wards.
The letter stated, “We advise in the interest of the party to discountenance that list as only our own is the authentic list.”
The chairmen also displayed documents of the election conducted last June in their various wards claiming to have video clips of the congress.
The trio said their protest was not to disrupt the activities of the party towards the forthcoming primaries, but to demand their right as chairmen of their respective wards.
They lamented the failure of the state government to resolve the issue days after it had been notified.
The chairmen threatened that the only solution was to go to court, noting that they were aware that the constitution forbade such regulation.
Efforts to get the reaction of the state chairman of the party, Yemi Sanusi, were futile. He neither answered calls made to his mobile nor replied to a text message sent.
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