The Ali Modu Sheriff-led faction of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, which held its primary in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital on Monday, August 29, 2016, did so without the presence of observers from the country’s electoral body, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
An Ondo State High Court, sitting in Akure, had restrained the Sheriff faction from holding the parallel primary.
The Resident Electoral Commissioner in Ondo State, Mr. Segun Agbaje, said the commission did not send anybody to monitor the primary of Sheriff’s faction of the PDP.
When asked by newsmen whether the commission sent a representative to the primary, Agbaje said ” No, thank you.”
Also, a source within the commission said the Sheriff’s faction formally informed the state’s branch of the commission about the event and requested for monitoring, but its request was turned down because there was no directive from the national secretariat of the INEC to send representatives to the primary.
“We can not attend such a primary because we have no directive from our national secretariat,” the source said.
The presiding judge, Justice Omolara Adejumo, in her ruling said no PDP’s faction should conduct any primary outside the one that had been conducted by the Clement Faboyede-led State Congress.
She also ordered Mr. Jimoh Ibrahim, Sola Ebiseni, Bamiduro Dada and Niran Sule not to parade themselves as the aspirants for such parallel primary.
Justice Adejumo said, “I have read motion paper and the affidavit of same, I have also considered the provision of the law relied upon in bringing the application. It is my view that the application has merit.”
However, in spite the court order, the parallel primary of the Sheriff’s faction was conducted in Ibadan and Mr. Jimoh Ibrahim was reported to have emerged the winner
