ISHOLA Balogun-Fulani-led All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kwara state has asked the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to withdraw the list of candidates of the APC from the state which was published by the commission last week.
It is recalled that the INEC had published names of senatorial and House of Representatives’ candidates for the coming general elections last week, while the court-backed Balogun-Fulani faction of the Kwara APC had protested that names of its candidates for the said election were absent on the list.
The party, in a letter, addressed to the chairman, INEC, through its counsel, Yusuf O. Ali & Co., and dated January 21, 2019, charged INEC to publish names of candidates submitted by its party in line with the judgment of Kwara State High Court, to sanitize the processes associated with the publication of names of eligible candidates ”by restoring credibility and legality to the commission in the spirit of rule of law.”
In the letter, which was also copied to the European Union, the Socio-Economic Right and Accountability Project (SERAP), the APC expressed dismay that INEC, ”published strange names as senatorial and House of Representatives candidates benefiting from judgment of the Kwara State High Court delivered in suit as candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC) from Kwara State against whose names “Court Order” was written in the list of names of candidates published by your Commission on January 17, 2019.
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The Balogun-Fulani led APC executive said that what the Commission did by inserting ‘Court order’ against the names of the Senatorial and House of Representatives candidates when there is no court order to that effect sounds ”criminal, fraudulent and deceitful manipulation or representation of facts by the Commission.”
According to the letter, “it is gravely worrisome, curious and strange that names of persons that never obtained any judgment or order of court of competent jurisdiction would be accepted, countenanced, presented and/or put forward by your Commission as the lawful and legitimate candidates standing on the crest of ‘Court Order’ that was never obtained from or granted by any court of law in Nigeria.”
The Kwara APC recalled that in judgement delivered on December 19, 2018, by the Kwara State High Court of Justice, Ilorin in which INEC was joined as the fifth defendant, all its reliefs were granted “in to to” by the court including the reliefs establishing that the Ishola Balogun-Fulani led executive as the authentic, valid and duly recognized Kwara State Executive Committee of the All Progressives Congress (APC) with four-year tenure of office commencing from the 6th June 2018, with the constitutional power to conduct primary elections of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kwara State among other things.
The party added that pursuant to the aforesaid judgment of the court, Counsel/Solicitors, Yusuf O. Ali & Co., in a letter dated December 26, 2018 duly served the Commission and duly acknowledged, forwarded duly certified copy of the enrolled order of the Court attached with the list of the names of the candidates elected through the primary elections conducted by the Balogun-Fulani led executive committee in line with the spirit and tenets of the said judgment of Ilorin High Court.
and then