‘352 delegates cast 661 votes in APC’s Yola congress’

A group in the All Progressives Congress (APC) of Yola North Local Government Area in Adamawa State has alleged massive electoral fraud during the party’s congresses.

Speaking at a news conference in Yola, Rilwanu Umar Sheriff, the spokesman of the group, said the election ran contrary to the guidelines, hence the need for a cancellation.

“It is important to note that three candidates contested for the post of chairmanship namely, Abdullahi Wali, Alh. Isa Bagalci, Alh. Salihu and Baba Ahmed. The total number of delegates that participated in the election was 352 however, when votes were cast and counted the total number of votes cast became 661 as against the 352 votes expected,” he said.

Sheriff said that Salihu Baba-Ahmad, the Adamawa interim publicity secretary, was declared winner in the party chairmanship election.

He also alleged that the person declared winner in the election in to the office of youths leader did not contest for the election, calling on the party to look into the allegations with a view to addressing the situation.

“The same thing happened to the post of Youth leader. The total votes of 522 was recorded as against the 352 delegates accredited to vote. More importantly, the person who recorded the highest vote of 271 (Suleiman Alkali) was never a candidate in the first place”, he said.

State interim publicity secretary of APC, Salihu Baba Ahmed, however denied the allegation.

He said, when contacted by our correspondent, that the number of votes did not exceed the number of delegates in any of the elections and explained that the confusion might have arisen from the fact that all the elections were lumped together and the difference in number might be those of the other election.

He said moreover there was an agreement for party members to accept the outcome of the election from the beginning.