An aspirant for Yobe state governorship ticket on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mallam Umar Ali, kicked against the result of the primary election held at the weekend in the state.
At the end of the election held at Damaturu, the state capital, APC’s national secretary, Mai Mala Buni was declared winner of the poll.
Mala Buni was anointed for the post by the state governor Ibrahim Geidam.
In a statement by his campaign office, Ali said he was rejecting the results after a review of “overwhelming evidences pointing to manipulation of the process”.
The aspirant’s campaign organisation said it has collated video evidences showing irregularities, contrary to the election guidelines.
“The ballot papers used for the election is different from what is approved by the national headquarters. Candidates’ pictures, as seen in ballots used in places like Borno, Katsina, among others, were missing on the ballots used in Yobe.
“Also, instead of thump printing, they adopted writing names of candidates on the ballots. This gave the opportunity for some biased persons to write the name of the anointed aspirant on all ballot papers that got into their hands, in the name of helping delegates,” the statement alleged.
The aspirant also complained that there was no accreditation of delegates, as stipulated in the election guidelines, making it contentious to ascertain who was a delegate or not.
Mallam Ali said he has written to the national headquarters of the party and the election appeal panel to protest the alleged misconducts.
