2023: Major Setback for APC As Court Nullifies Guber Primary, Sacks Candidate in Powerful Northern State

The Benue state chapter of the All Progressive Congress (APC) will be going through another hurdle to decide its gubernatorial candidate
With less than six weeks to the general elections, an appellate court sitting in Makurdi has issued a ruling nullifying the guber primary election of the party
The court held that the initial primary polls conducted were invalid and the party was given 14 days to conduct another primary election

Benue, Makurdi – An appeal court verdict has nullified the gubernatorial primary election of the All Progressive Congress (APC) in Benue state.

The appellate court sitting in Markurdi in its ruling issued two weeks ultimate for fresh primaries to be conducted in eleven out of the 23 constituents of the state.

The appellate court issued two weeks ultimatum to the APC to conduct fresh primary polls for all the gubernatorial candidates vying for the number one administrative seat in Benue state. Photo: APC
Source: UGC

As reported by the Leadership Newspaper, the appeal was filed by one of the gubernatorial aspirants Prof. Terhemba Shija.

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While delivering the judgement, Justice Gabriel Abraham Georgewill said:

“After evaluating evidence submitted by Shija which among many is the Appeal panel report that sat after the primaries to hear issues of concern from the aspirants in Makurdi and made recommendations that the primary election was not valid.”

Meanwhile, calabargistblog.com.ng gathered the appellate court validated the APC gubernatorial rerun of 9th June, 2022 which was held in 12 local governments.

While validating the rerun, Justice Gorgewill said:

“Yes, I have seen that APC did not conduct a valid primary election on 27th May, 2022 reasons why the appeal panel ordered a fresh election that was conducted on 9th June, 2022 in some local governments.

“In the interest of justice, I cannot allow those voters in the remaining 11 local government to be disenfranchised, therefore, APC should go back and conduct elections in eleven local government within 14 days and INEC should recognise the winner after adding both election results as the gubernatorial candidate of the party.”