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From Ighomuaye Lucky, Benin
The Edo State chapter of the National Rescue Movement (NRM) has tasked the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to include the name of its governorship candidate, Dennis Osahon Aikoriogie, in the list of those participating in the September 21 state governorship election.
The party, in a letter titled “Protest on non-inclusion of our gubernatorial candidate in the forthcoming Edo State governorship election coming up in September 2024, signed by its chairman, Sam Arase and its secretary, Asemota Solomon, respectively, and made available to newsmen in Benin, said that they were surprised that the party’s governorship candidate, having duly participated in the primary, supervised by INEC, his name was not among the list published by the commission.
“Today, we are happy that we are with INEC. We want to register our complaint to you, sir. We are not happy. We as members of this party, write to inform you that our party’s primary was conducted and monitored by this great office. Your office sent representatives and the police also sent their representatives and at the end of the day, the national headquarters of INEC came with its own representatives.
“We have documents here to that, that they all signed. They witnessed the primary and election was held and Dennis Osahon Aikoriogie was elected the gubernatorial candidate of the National Rescue Movement but to our surprise sir, when you announced a week ago that the list of parties that met up your requirements, our name was not mentioned.
“We are not happy about it and that is why we have come to register our complaint”, Arase said.
Mr. Arase said that the party wants the INEC to include its governorship candidate’s name so that they can get prepared for the forthcoming election.
Arase, in their letter to INEC, wants it to also apologise to the party for this embarrassment done to the party.
Responding, the Head of Department, Voter Education and Publicity, INEC, Mr Timidi Wariowe, said that actually, the commission did publish the names of the candidates and their particulars, on March 30.
He said that the reason the name of the party and its governorship candidate didn’t appear was because they did not send their names to INEC headquarters in Abuja.
“On this issue, what we gathered, was that there was no letter from the National Working Committee of your party from Abuja.
“There was no letter from the National Working Committee of NRM from the INEC headquarters from Abuja and that is to say, that your party did not send INEC headquarters the names, the time for the primary and the venue for the primary.
“So, we cannot go and monitor a primary or maybe letter being sent by the state office, we don’t accept that.
“We know that primaries are conducted by the National Working Committee of a party and we only receive correspondences from the National Working Committee of the party and it is done via INEC headquarters to the state office and then, we comply.
“You said that some persons from the state office went and monitored, let me tell you point blank that, those people that went to monitor, they are on their own.
“They didn’t get a directive from the Resident Electoral Commissioner and also didn’t get a directive from INEC headquarters,” Wariowe added.
