Bankole Taiwo, Abeokuta
The parallel governorship primaries of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Ogun state was ended abruptly on Wednesday following a shouting march and clash over delegates’ list.
The primaries held at Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library (OOPL) was brought to a halt when loyalists of two governorship aspirants, Ladi Adebutu and Jimi Lawal clashed over the delegate list to adopted for the exercise.
This comes few hours after another primary election was conducted and produced Otunba Segun Showunmi as the party’s candidate.
The major aspirants contesting for the governorship ticket of the party are: Ladi Adebutu, Jimi Lawal and Segun Sowunmi.
The parallel primaries which produced Otunba Segun Showunmi, former Spokesman to Alhaji Atiku Abubakar as the governorship candidate of the party for 2023 elections took place at Ogun NUJ Press Centre, Iwe Iroyin, Abeokuta. Showunmi was said to have polled 554 votes to clinch the ticket.
Few hours later, another primaries was called at the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library where Lawal and Adebutu attended but withnessed hot arguments and series of gunshots before the exercise ended abruptly.
Trouble had started shortly after the PDP electoral panel, headed by Prof Akase Sorkaa had announced the mode of conduct of the exercise.
Our correspondent who was at the venue observed that, some loyalists of Lawal, an ex-banker raised an objection, rejecting a delegate list brought from the national secretariat of the party in Abuja.
This led to a shouting march between supporters of Lawal and Adebutu who also engaged one another pushing and shoving.
One of the aides of Lawal, Austin Oniyokor who brought some documents claiming to have been certified by the INEC, insisted that the exercise must not take place unless the said document is adopted.
The drama which lasted for over 30 minutes saw security operatives helpless while INEC officials temporarily relocated from the hall.
“This exercise cannot be conducted with fake list. These are INEC generated documents. These are your certified documents,” Oniyokor shouted while addressing INEC officials.
While still waiting for the party officials to to find solutions to the impasse, sound of gunshots from outside the hall caused journalists and other delegates to scamper for safety.
As at the time of filing this report, the outcome of the parallel exercise cannot be predicted but Otunba Jimi Lawal had left the hall.