JUST IN; Kaduna LG Polls: APC Disqualifies 38 Out Of The 115 Chairmanship Aspirants

JUST IN; Kaduna LG Polls: APC Disqualifies 38 Out Of The 115 Chairmanship Aspirants

Kaduna State chapter of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has declared that 38 out of the 115 aspirants that purchased forms to contest for the chairmanship positions of their various local government areas are not suitable to contest its primaries ahead of the election.

Some of the reasons for their disqualification include that some of them have been indicted for undisclosed offences and thus may not be good for the party’s image in the long run.

It would be recalled that the party organised written examination for the chairmanship aspirants, being the first in the history of Nigeria, as condition for qualification to contest election into the chairmanship positions of the local governments.

The aspirants were equally subjected to physical and thorough oral interview by a panel of 17 members made up of professors, lawyers and holders of doctorate degrees among others.

The chairmanship hopefuls were also made to write biographical essay on their life, schools attended, work experiences, places lived or visited within Kaduna State, Nigeria and abroad.

Among the 115 aspirants that purchased the forms to contest for the tickets of the party at the primaries, 75 of them were declared suitable to contest the primaries, 38 of them were declared unsuitable and two of the aspirants failed to return their purchased forms.

When the APC state chairman, Air Commodore Emmanuel Jekada (rtd) was contacted and asked particularly about those declared not suitable, he asked rhetorically, “ Do you expect all of them to be successful? The essence of the exam and screening is basically to ensure that those that are not suitable haven been given equal opportunities to prove themselves are not allowed to go into the primaries.”

“ We are doing this to ensure that it is not business as usual and to strengthen the party ahead of the primaries and the actual election and if the list we pasted at the state secretariat is what you have, that is the results of the examination and screening,” he added.

Among those declared not suitable is an incumbent local government chairman of one of the local governments in Kaduna central, on account of indictment by the report of the auditor general in 2019 for mismanagement of public funds/financial misappropriation.

The ALGON chairman in the state and one other incumbent chairman were also not lucky to get the nod of the party to seek reelection, this is just as it was gathered that one of the incumbent chairmen in one of the local governments in Southern Kaduna though declared suitable to contest has withdrawn from the race for unknown reason.