A State House of Assembly Candidate in Ogun State under the banner of Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), Semiu Oganla on Sunday cried out over a plot by some influential leaders of the party to rob him of his mandate.
The candidate told newsmen in Abeokuta that the plot was coming after his confirmation by the Independent Electoral Commission, (INEC), as the party's authentic candidate for the race.
Our correspondent reliably gathered that, Oganla's name was included in the INEC approved list of candidates on page 165, titled, 2015 State House of Assembly Final List', and he is cleared to represent the party in Abeokuta North Local Government Area, having earlier won party primaries with 70 votes out of the total 80 votes cast during the party primaries held on November 29, 2014.
Findings also revealed that the result showed that his co-contestants at the primaries which include; Olugbenga Adebayo scored 8 votes, Eyitayo Soleye recorded 1 vote, while Amodu Taofeek and Salau Modupeola did not show up.
Ironically, few weeks to the general election, the party sought an order from the Federal High Court, Ikoyi Lagos under Justice O.E. Abang to replace his name with Eyitayo Soleye, son of former Minister for Finance, Onaolapo Soleye, who at the primaries scored one vote.
In a motion of notice, suit number FHC/L/CS/347/12, the party claimed that there was a typographical error in submitting the name of Oganla, hence, the request to replace him with Soleye.
"An order correcting the typographical error in the names of candidate listed in the order of this honourable court made on the 15th day of December 2014 by properly stating the names of candidates for the constituencies listed below as shown hereunder and deleting the names mistakenly listed for the same constituencies in the said order to wit;...(11) Eyitayo Soleye replacing Semiu Oganla for Abeokuta North), the motion reads.
The motion on notice in possession of our correspondent was filed on January 28, 2015 by R.A Oluyede of D96 Landbridge Avenue, Victoria Island Annex, Lagos.
In the same vein, an affidavit in support of the motion on notice filed by Chinedu Mbata, a litigation officer in the law office of the solicitor stated that the party Secretary, Semiu Sodipo erroneously forwarded the name of the candidate in a hurry.
"In the haste to send the result sheets and reports to our office in view of the urgency involved, he inadvertently sent a report of primaries for the House of Representatives, which contained an error in the name of the candidate of the party for Abeokuta North/Odeda/Obafemi-Owode constituency'i" t reads.
"He also made a mistake in wrongly forwarding to our office an incorrect result of the primaries for Remo North and Abeokuta North State Constituencies," the court papers added.
But, in his reaction, the party candidate for Abeokuta North House of Assembly petitioned the Indepedent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), alleging crooked plans by some members of the party to substitute his name.
Oganla in his petition, insisted that, he was the nominated candidate of the party, having convincingly won the primaries, and his name forwarded to the electoral body and also published among the list of names of various parties candidates of Abeokuta North State Constituency.
According to him, "Some unscrupulous elements within the party are crookedly planning to short change me by trying to substitute my name to that of one Eyitayo Soleye, their favourite, under the guise that my name was typographically in error forwarded to INEC.
The candidate further alleged that, an earlier attempt by the elements was to forge his signature in a purportedly written withdrawal letter, but when the plot failed, they now resolved to hide under what they called typographical error and approached a court to file a motion, stressing that, he would not succumb to the plot to do away with his mandate.
Post a Comment Blogger Facebook Disqus