Biodun Oyebanji, the immediate past secretary to Ekiti Government in the Fayemi administration, has emerged winner of the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship primaries.
Oyebanji polled 101,703 votes out of the total number of votes cast, chairman of the primary election committee Governor Abubakar Badaru of Jigawa said on Thursday at the party’s secretariat in Ado-Ekiti.
“It is my pleasure to declare Biodun Oyebanji as the winner of this primary, haven scored the highest votes cast,” he said.
“Haven satisfied all necessary criteria, I hereby declare Abiodun Abayomi Oyebanji as the winner.”
He added that Ekiti APC had 183,560 registered members, 107,877 members were accredited and total votes cast was 104,983.
Badaru expressed surprise at the allegations by some aspirants that they were not consulted, adding that 20 names were submitted by each of the aspirants to be added to the list of the returning and they were all captured.
He, however, explained that the meeting that was earlier slated for Thursday morning, between the committee and the aspirants was cancelled because there was security report that the venue was tensed.
He said they had to call for assistance of the security agents to arrest the situation.
The chairman said that the primaries took place across the 177 wards and that it was free and fair.
“However, there are pockets of violence, when we receive the results, we will know where we need to cancel, we will.
“As we have earlier promised, we have ensured a level playing ground for all aspirants,” Badaru added.
On the protest by some of the aspirants, the committee chairman added that he had not received any official petition but only heard about it via the news media.
The results presented by the 16 local government area returning officers revealed that Oyebanji won in all the council areas.
The breakdown of the results revealed other aspirants score as follows: Senator Opeyemi Bamidele, 760, Femi Bamisile, 400, Kayode Ojo, 767, Senator Adedayo Adeyeye, 691 and Bamidele Faparusi, 376.
Others were Demola Popoola, 239, and Oluwasola Afolabi, 47.
Six of the eight aspirants had on Thursday morning protested alleged hijack of the exercise and called for its stoppage and cancellation.
