Tribune
AS leaders of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) row over its delayed convention, details are beginning to emerge on how the party might arrive at its chairmanship aspirant at the convention as well as its presidential candidate.
Ahead of the convention, the list of delegates is critical with contenders for party Chairmanship and for the presidential ticket keen to exert their influence on delegates from their individual zones and across board.
Members of the Governor Mai Mala Buni-led committee are expected to meet in Abuja, on Tuesday, in the bid to resolve all outstanding issues delaying the convention while the list of delegates will be presented to President Muhammadu Buhari, any moment from now.
Going by the list, a tough battle lies ahead of some power brokers, presidential aspirants and chairmanship if they hope to go beyond retaining their immediate constituencies: states of origin and zone.
They will require to embark on aggressive lobbying across the zones in order to keep their presidential and chairmanship bid afloat.
A breakdown of the list sighted by the Nigerian Tribune showed that the issue of direct primary appears foreclosed for the convention.
According to the document, no fewer than 4509 delegates may be accredited for the convention with the North-West having the highest number (1059); followed by the South-South with 959 delegates.
The rest are South-West is 897 delegates; North-Central (714); North-East (562) and South-East is allocated 560 delegates.
All the APC chairmanship aspirants are from the NorthCentral while the presidential hopefuls hail from the southern axis of the country.
It was observed that though the table showed 11 categories of delegates qualified to participate in such a convention, only three were captured in the list.
These are the state working committees (SWC), Local Government Area Party chairmen and secretaries and elected national delegates.
From the document, a total of 336 delegates are expected from the North-East, comprising 102 SWC delegates; 224 LGA chairmen and secretary and 336 elected national delegates.
The zone comprises Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Taraba and Yobe states, with Borno having the largest number of delegates consisting of 17 SWC delegates; 54 LGA chairmen and secretaries and 81 elected national delegates.
For the North-Central, Niger State tops the list of such delegates with 17 SWC; 50 as LGA chairmen and secretaries; and 75 elected national delegates. States in the zone include Benue, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Plateau and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
According to the list, next to Niger State are Benue and Kogi states with 17 SWC, 46 LGA chairmen and secretaries and 69; as well as 17, 42 and 63 as elected national delegates in that order. The overall number for the zone is 119 as SWC delegates; 242 for LGA party chairmen and secretaries and 353 as elected national delegates.
In the South-East, Imo has the highest number of delegates with 81 as national delegates; 54 LGA party chairmen and secretaries; 17 SMC.
Coming after Imo is Anambra State, with 17 SMC; 42 as LGA party chairmen and secretaries and 63 elected national delegates.
In all, 285 are elected delegates, consisting of 190 as LGA party chairmen and secretaries, as well as 85 SWC delegates from the South-East that comprises Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Imo.
Incidentally, Ebonyi has the least number of delegates with 17 SWC; 26 as LGA party chairmen and secretaries, as well as just 39 elected national delegates.
The North-West comprises Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Sokoto and Zamfara states.
The figure for the elected national delegates are 132 for Kano; 88 for LGA party chairmen and secretary and 17 for SWC, while that of Katsina is 112; 88 and 17; Jigawa (81, 54 and 17) delegates.
In the South-West, Oyo State tops the list of delegates and the figures consist of 17 state working committee members, 66 LGA party chairmen and secretaries, and 99 elected national delegates.
It is followed by Osun with 90 national delegates, 60 LGA party chairmen and secretaries and 17 state working committee members.
Both Lagos and Ogun state have an equal number of LGA chairmen and secretaries, that is, 40 delegates and 60 elected national delegates each.
Ondo State has 36 LGA party chairmen and secretaries; 54 as elected national delegates and 17 state working committees as delegates.
Ekiti has the least number in the overall figure for the South-West with 17 as SWC delegates; 32 LGA party chairmen and secretaries and 48 elected national delegates.
The table indicated that the total number of elected national delegates from the zone is 521; 274 as LGA party chairmen and secretaries and 102 for SWC.
The figure for the South-South showed that Akwa Ibom, the home state of the Minister of the Niger Delta, Godswill Akpabio, has 93 as elected national delegates, the highest in the zone.
Apart from 17 as SWC delegates, the state has 62 LGA party chairmen and secretaries as delegates, while Delta, where the deputy president of the Senate, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege and the Minister of State for Labour, Mr Festus Keyamo (SAN) hail from, is allocated 50 LGA party chairmen and secretaries as delegates, as well as 75 as elected national delegates.
Rivers and Edo come third with 36 LGA party chairmen and secretaries and 54 elected national delegates. According to the source, besides the 102 SWC delegates, the total number of LGA party chairmen and secretaries for the zone is 246, while the elected national delegates is 369.
This story first appeared in Tribune
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