2019 Guber, Assembly Polls: INEC Seals Rivers APC’s Hope …Delists Cole, Others From Final List …Excludes Zamfara APC Candidates,Too

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has released the final list of governorship and House of Assembly candidates in Rivers State, with candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC) missing.
It would be recalled that INEC had Thursday, January 17, released a list signed by the commission’s Secretary, Rose Orianran-Anthony, and while candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Social Democratic Party (SDP) and Labour Party, among others, made the list, those of the All Progressives Congress (APC) were excluded.
A Federal High Court in Port Harcourt, the state capital had nullified the direct and indirect primaries conducted by the two factions of the APC in Rivers State.
The court presided over by Justice Kolawole Omotosho held that both primaries were not conducted according to the law.
Omotosho had also restrained the electoral body from recognising Arch Tonye Cole and Senator Magnus Abe as governorship candidates of the APC in the general elections.
Abe was declared the winner of a direct governorship primary conducted by a faction of the party in 2018 after polling 144, 929 votes while Cole emerged the winner of an indirect primary held by another faction with 3,329 votes.
Following the rulings, the Resident Electoral Commissioner in Rivers State, Obo Effanga, insisted that the electoral umpire would always obey court injunctions.
In the same vein, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) refused to shift ground on its earlier decision to stop the All Progressives Congress (APC) from presenting candidates for the forthcoming general elections in Zamfara State.
INEC, which had earlier said it would release the final list of governorship and State Assembly candidates, yesterday, however, said the status quo remained unchanged.
The commission made the clarification in a statement issued, last Wednesday night by its National Commissioner and Chairman of its Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye.
Okoye said, “The Independent National Electoral Commission met on Wednesday, January 30 2019, and among other things, approved the final list of candidates for the governorship, State Assembly and FCT Area Council elections scheduled to hold on March 2, 2019.
“On the whole, there are 1, 066 candidates for the governorship elections, 14, 583 for the State Assembly elections and 806 for the FCT Area Council elections broken down into 105 chairmanship candidates and 701 councillorship candidates.”
Meanwhile, there were serious jubilations within the opposition parties in Zamfara State as the INEC, yesterday, disqualified all the candidates of the APC in the state from contesting the 2019 general elections in the state.
According to the governorship candidate of the PDP in the state, Dr Bello Mohammed Matawalle, the official release from the commission which excluded the state wing of APC from contesting the elections was a very transparent development.
According to him, INEC has proved to Nigerians that the 2019 general elections would be free, fair, credible and acceptable.
According to him, INEC has obeyed the judiciary, noting that the Federal High court’s judgment supersedes a state High Court, appealing to the commission to ensure that justice prevails in the 2019 general elections.
In another reaction, the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Alhaji Sani Abdullahi Shinkafi noted that he was waiting for APC in the state to flag-off its campaign before going to the Appeal Court, noting that INEC has done what was expected of the commission to do.
The presidential candidate of Nigerian Elements Progressive Party (NEPP), Comrade Ishaka Paul Ofemile said he was impressed with the decision of INEC.
He noted that Nigeria was so big for anybody to use federal might or power of incumbency to manipulate the decision of over 150 million citizens.
On his part, Senator Garba Kabiru Marafa, representing Zamfara Central Senatorial District in the National Assembly, pointed out that Governor Abdulaziz Yari wanted to prove to the world that he was the Alpha and Omega in the state.
The senator noted that Yari came to the political limelight from nowhere through the political influence of Senator Ahmad Sani Yarima.
Marafa noted that even though he was not going to contest the governorship election, he was satisfied that Yari did not achieve his selfish interest after all.
Meanwhile, all the APC candidates and their supporters have remained silent, waiting for the governor to enter the state Government House and make a public statement.
It would be recalled that the faction of the governor within the party had conducted the party primary elections in the state which the G8 group, the national headquarters of APC and INEC rejected.
The rejection of the primaries forced the camp of the governor to proceed to court against both the national headquarters of the party and INEC, praying the court to uphold the primaries.
However, the state High Court sitting in Gusau, the state capital, upheld the primaries while the Federal High Court, Abuja, declared the elections non-acceptable, thereby, upholding the decision of INEC not to allow the APC candidates in the state to contest the general elections.
It was not yet known what would be the next line of action by the state chapter of the party even though it was gathered that President Muhammadu Buhari has now concluded plans for his presidential campaign in the state.