On Tuesday, elders of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Ondo State chapter, declared Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa as their preferred candidate in the forthcoming party primary election in the state, News About Nigeria reports.
According to the elders, they have all unanimously agreed to support the state governor as the party’s flagbearer in the forthcoming gubernatorial election scheduled for November 16, 2024.
Their decision was reached at a meeting that was held today in Akure, the Ondo State capital.
Speaking after the meeting, the chairman of the Ondo APC Elders Forum, Sola Iji, said the group decided to follow the recommendations of the committee set up to assess all the governorship aspirants and pick the best out of them.
According to him, they had penned down Aiyedatiwa’s name along with two other frontline aspirants, which included the late Paul Akintelure and a former Commissioner for Finance, Mr. Wale Akinterinwa.
Iji said, “We resolved in our first meeting to commit ourselves to a unanimous goal in the forthcoming governorship primary of the APC in the state. We consider this as a necessary step towards asserting our true worth in the party. Nevertheless, during our second meeting, we unanimously agreed to set up a nine-man committee headed by Mrs Christy Olufowose to identify the various aspirants jostling for the ticket of our party; assess them using some well-thought-out criteria and present three of them for further consideration by the leadership of the group.
“However, in determining the choice of our preferred aspirant, the leaders believed that it was normal and conventional to offer a right of first refusal to His Excellency, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, as a sitting governor. On the whole, having been satisfied with the conduct and performance of His Excellency, Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa, we are pleased to inform the general public that he is our preferred aspirant in the forthcoming governorship primary of APC in Ondo State.”
He further noted that with this decision, they are committed to deploying all that is needed to ensure that the governor emerges as the winner in the party’s primary election slated for April 20, 2024.
