Electoral Act: APC orders ministers, appointees interested in 2023 polls to resign

 

• Denies fixing presidential primary May 30

The All Progressives Congress (APC) has directed all political appointees interested in contesting the 2023 general elections to be ready to resign their positions in compliance with the new Electoral Act.

The party equally dismissed the speculation that its national leadership has fixed its presidential primary for May 30.

APC National Publicity Secretary (NPS), Felix Morka, gave the directive after the inaugural meeting of National Working Committee (NWC) at the party’s secretariat in Abuja, yesterday.

Responding to the question on the position of the party on the new Electoral Act, Morka said: “Everyone involved intends to comply fully with the intendment and letters of the Electoral Act. The Ministers are members of the party. And the party is the ruling party. Now, both the ministers, other appointees and the party’s leadership have excellent counsel and guidance. I am sure everyone involved intends to comply fully with the intendment and letters of the Electoral Act.”

Dismissing the trending date for the presidential primaries, Morka said though the national leadership of the party deliberated on the timetable and schedule of activities, there was however no iota of truth on the date for the primary in circulation.

Apart from the speculated date for the presidential primary, the document in circulation also fixed the commencement for the sale of expression and nomination forms between Friday, April 22 and Saturday, May 7.

Other items contained in the party’s timetable and schedule of activities for the 2023 general elections, include primaries for state House of Assembly, on Tuesday, May 17, legislative relations for House of Representatives and Senate, Saturday, May 21, while governorship primary was for Tuesday, May 24, 2022.

But sked whether the report was part of the resolution taken during the NWC meeting, Morka said: “Today the NWC of the APC met and among other topics covered as you would probably expected, we discussed the programme for our party’s primaries looking at the schedule of activities for the forthcoming elections. I will not be able to give you a run down of the details of that schedule because that is still in discussion

“We are yet to conclude on a definite plan or timetable or schedule for our primaries. But, I can confirm that we did have that conversation today. We began it today. But we have not concluded or made any decision on it.”

On whether he is denying the date of the presidential primary as been reported in some the media, he said: “I can confirm that we have discussions. But we have not made any decision yet. I am not aware of anything that is trending because we have not put up any information into the public space about the schedule of our primaries.”