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The sensational lies from the APC presidential primaries

The All Progressives Congress (APC) convention and presidential primaries, on Wednesday, December 10 and Thursday, December 11, 2014, at Teslim Balogun Stadium, Surulere, Lagos, was as dramatic as it was exciting.

And as the party was in the process of selecting its presidential flag bearer in the 2015 election, several stories, rumours and lies were flying across the social media sphere.

Encomium Weekly takes a quick look at some of the lies and shocking stories that emanated from the recently concluded APC presidential primary.

Some aspirants stepped down, then did not

While all eyes were on the Teslim Balogun Stadium,Lagos, venue of the convention, the National Television Authority (NTA) goofed, not once but twice, lying to millions of Nigerians first that an aspirant, the publisher of the Leadership newspapers, Mr. Sam Nda Isaiah had stepped down for the eventual winner, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari. The NTA tweeted, @NTANewsNow BREAKING: Sam Nda Isaiah steps down for Muhammadu Buhari #APCdecides”

As if that was not enough, the NTA followed it up with another phantom breaking news just 40 minutes after when it tweeted that another aspirant, this time, Imo State governor, Rochas Okorocha had stepped down for the people’s general, Buhari. “@NTANewsNow BREAKING: Gov Rochas Okorocha steps down for Muhammadu Buhari #APCdecides”

Contrary to their reports, however, all five aspirants – Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Gov. Rochas Okorocha, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, Gov. Rabiu Kwankwanso and Mr. Sam Nda Isaiah – contested and the winner, Buhari emerged after a very transparent process.

Unprecedented dollarization by a desperate aspirant

Another story that came out of the convention ground was the hard currencies that exchanged hands in a bid to buy votes.

One of the coordinators of the Buhari campaign organization, Mr. Bola Ilori took to his Facebook wall to express dismay at the amounts being thrown around.

He said, “Crazy things are happening here!!! Some of these cannot represent the change Nigeria is yearning for. Excessive dollarization by one of the aspirants is to say the least obscene.

“I have been involved in political process for decades now, I have never witnessed this volume of raw dollarization of party primaries. I only read about this kind of things in PDP primaries. A question being asked by conscientious delegates is that whoever can be giving out between $2,000 to $5,000 to each delegate certainly does not represent the kind of change Nigerians want.

“Those who contributed to the pauperization of the country now revel in dollarization, Oma se o! If this is what is called internal democracy then I guess it’s not the best for Nigerian situation yet”.

Encomium

Written by Encomium

A media, tech and events company.

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