National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Comrade Adams Oshiomhole on Thursday dashed the hope of a possible refund of money to aspirants who lost the party’s governorship ticket in the just-concluded Kogi primary.
Oshiomhole, who was addressing newsmen after meeting with the 16 aspirants, said the party has a tradition which has to be maintained.
Out of the 16 aspirants that bought the nomination and expression of interest form at the cost of N22.5 million, seven of them were not cleared to participate in the exercise for various reasons.
But nine others, including Governor Yahaya Bello, who won the ticket, were cleared.
Oshiomhole said: “Our party is guided by rules. If there are issues that we need to discuss, those are APC issues and not meant for the Press.
“We are not doing election for the first time. We have traditions and we don’t have any applicationbefore us.”
He added: “This afternoon, we had extensive conversation as APC family to talk through issues arising from the Kogi state governorship primary which was conducted last week.
“I am sure that you know some of those who participated or attempted to participate in the process. They are men and women who, by any criteria can be said to be fit and proper persons to govern a state.
“But as you know, in democracy, if you have 16 angels as we had seeking the mandate of the people to produce just one person as governor, it means that 15 angels will not get it.
“So, winning or losing a primary is not a statement of your integrity, you capacity, your capability or your intellect. It is simply a fact that once you have more than one candidate and you have only one vacancy, only one person will win.
“As you already know, Governor Badaru of Jigawa state led the team that conducted the primary in Kogi state and have declared Governor Yahaya Bello as the winner of that exercise.
“We therefore decided to invite all those who participated in the process or wanted to participate and for one reason or the other, were not able to do so to have a conversation on the need to put the conduct of that process behind us.
“Usually in every campaign, aspirants tends to bad mouth each other, while trying to projectthemselves and people could fee injured, people could get angry over statements made. In our own part of the country, there can also be issues of how the exercise was conducted, whether it was free or not free.
“I want to thank all those who participated in the process and to thank our party members in Kogi state and going forward, to thank the good people of Kogi state who do not belong to any political party and whose future, our party is committed to improving by using the instrument of state in a way that will add value to the lives of the people of Kogi state.”
The APC chairman announced that all those who lost out in the process have assured the party that will not challenge the outcome of the exercise in court, but will work for the success of the party during the election.