Osun APC primaries: Oyetola in early lead

From Bamigbola Gbolagunte, Osogbo

Osun State Governor Gboyega Oyetola, barring any last-minute changes, may be announced the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the July governorship election in Osun State.

Oyetola who contested against the former Secretary to Osun State Government, Alhaji Moshood Adeoti and former Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Lasun Yusuf was leading in the election conducted in all the wards across the 36 Local Government Areas of the state.

Results released in many of the wards as at press time showed that Oyetola is leading his opponents with a wide margin.

Findings revealed that Oyetola won in almost all the polling centres in the state, defeating both Adeoti and Yusuf.

However, a faction of the party loyal to the Minister of Interior, Mr Rauf Aregbesola alleged that the election was marred by irregularities.

A statement issued by the Publicity Secretary of the faction, Mr Abiodun Agboola alleged that the election was marred by a series of irregularities by the faction loyal to Oyetola.

Agboola said, “We strongly condemned the conduct of the primary election because it is nothing but a sham with a fraudulent process to favour Governor Adegboyega Oyetola.

“Verified information from the agents of Alhaji Moshood Adeoti, our governorship aspirant, has it that there was no record and result sheets in any of the 332 wards of the state.

“Also, there was no proper accreditation in the majority of the ward collation centres where voting was taken place. The accreditation done in some places were skewed in favour of Governor Gboyega Oyetola as members of the group were allowed to pass through the accreditation process without much ado.

“Names of a sizeable number of members of the APC who wanted to vote for Adeoti were missing in the register of the party. This we had envisaged by calling for the display of party register before the conduct of the primary.

“We also need to inform the general public that appointees of Governor Oyetola were used as Collation Officers, which made the rigging plan of Oyetola an easy task. This we strongly condemned yesterday at the stakeholders meeting with the Primary Committee,” he added.