Primaries: APC dismisses Amosun, Okechukwu claims

…Says VON DG speaking out of despiration
The national leadership of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has dismissed the claims of the Director General of the Voice of Nigeria (VON), Osita Okechukwu, over the just concluded party primaries, saying he is speaking out of respiration.

The party also described as laughable the claims by Ogun State Governor Ibikunle Amosun that the primaries was poorly conducted.

Both Amosun and Okechukwu had accused the National Chairman of the party, Adams Oshiomohle, of bias during the primary where they both directly and indirectly lost out.

Ogun State governor’s annoited governorship aspirant failed to pick the ticket while Osita Okechukwu lost the senatorial ticket in Enugu State.

Speaking with journalits on Wednesday in Abuja, the National Publicity Secretary, Lanre Onilu, attributed the grievances being expressed by both the governor and the VON DG as a result of frustrations, having lost at the primaries.

When asked to respond to some of the issues raised on a national TV on Wednesday by the VON DG, the APC spokesman said: “Okechukwu is a highly respected member of the party, a very senior member but you can also understand that it is not about him and the party,

it is about him picking the senatorial ticket of his constituency and that is about ambition, and when that does not happen, you don’t expect him not to cry, he has right to ventilate this anger and it is for the party to also listen to him.

“He may have gone over board to the making of ill-accusations but you also have to understand his present situation, he lost out. If that same process had favoured him, he will be in his office, in an air conditioned atmosphere, drinking coffee and taking a laugh at whoever is complaining but it didn’t work for him.

So you don’t expect him not to complain and there must be someone to blame in such a situation. So, he has picked on the chairman unfortunately.

“But the chairman has no blame in this. If you have issues with the process fine, you can complain about the process.

We have an appeal panel that was set up for those with issues to take recourse to that and the internal mechanism for dispute resolution of the party is very strong and responsive and it is therefore meant for all party members to access no matter how high or low”.

Commenting on the visit of Ogun State Governor, Ibikunle Amosun, to President Muhammadu Buhari with some traditional rulers, Oniru said: “He (Amosun) took the certain monarchs, some traditional rulers from Ogun State to come and meet the president.

I am surprised because someone like him, with due respect should have understood the nature of the president we have, that no matter how close you are to him, he will listen to you but he will ask for the right thing to be done.

“So, the problem he has is that, he was looking for who to blame, and Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and Aremo Segun Osoba readily came under attack and he blamed them for that.

The question to ask is whether they were the ones who gave directive to him to organise his own primaries or they were the one who instructed him not to participate in the primaries or his candidate not to participate in primaries the party organised”.