Mr. David Lyon on Wednesday emerged as the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, for the Bayelsa State governorship election.
Lyon who polled 42,138 votes to defeat five other aspirants in the primary election was declared winner by Senator Emmanuel Dangana, the collation Officer for the election.
Meanwhile, one of the aspirants, a former Minister of State for Agriculture, Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri, has said the result of the primary election was unacceptable to him.
He said he was still trying to get details of what took place in Bayelsa as he and his team never participated in any primaries that declared David Lyon the winner of the party’s guber ticket.
It is believed that Lyon is the preferred candidate of the Minister of State for Petroleum and former Governor of Bayelsa, Timipre Sylva.
Dangana also said Diseye Poweigha came second with 1,533 votes while Maureen Etebu got 964 votes.
Ebitimi Amgbare polled 633 votes while Lokpobiri and Preye Aganaba got 571 and 354 votes respectively.
Dangana, flanked by other officials of the team, said the APC used the direct primary method to conduct the exercise across the state and adjudged the process
peaceful, free and fair.
Lokpobiri, who is a frontline APC aspirant in the state, on the other hand, said there was no way he would be defeated in any election in Bayelsa by Lyon saying that majority of APC members in the state were supporting him.
He wondered why a primary was said to have started in a hotel in Yenagoa and ended in the hotel side lining the secretariat of the party in the state.
According to him, party members had gathered at the secretariat in Yenagoa and waited in vain for the arrival of the committee responsible for the conduct of the primaries.
Lokpobiri also wondered why the result was declared by someone other than the Returning Officer and Governor of Yobe State, Mai Mala Buni, who chaired the committee.
The former minister however, expressed optimism that the party’s national leadership would look into the development and take steps to ensure a credible process that would throw up a popular candidate for the APC.
