There is uncertainty in the camp of the Rivers State Governor, Sir Siminalayi Fubara, over their fate in the forthcoming House of Assembly and governorship primary elections of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The APC had scheduled the House of Assembly primary election to hold on Wednesday, May 20th and the internal governorship poll to hold on Thursday, May 21st.

Fubara was among the four governorship aspirants from Rivers APC screened for the primary election while others were Ovunda Kingsley Chinda, Alabo Dakorinama George-Kelly and Tonye Cole.

It was gathered that the camp of the governor was pensively waiting for the results of the screening committee to know whether the governor would contest the poll.

Stakeholders had continued to query the circumstances that surrounded his screening when he appeared before the Abuja panel headed by the National Chairman of the party.

It was widely reported that the governor stormed out of the venue of the screening looking ruffled and failing to answer questions from the reporters on ground.

Besides Fubara, all his loyalists, including top supporters like Chijoke Ihunwo and Victor Oko-Jumbo, were among the 65 aspirants, who participated in the screening for the House of Assembly primary elections, but were not cleared by the committee.

About 19 of the uncleared aspirants later appeared before the Appeal Panel chaired by Abdul Mahmud.

The panel was said to have spent about two days in the state to hear their complaints and later filed it’s report to the National Working Committee of the party.

It was gathered on Tuesday that the loyalists of the governor were still waiting patiently for the results of the appeal panel to know their fate in Wednesday's primary election.

But a source from the party said it was unlikely that the panel would approve their admission as aspirants because of their failure to produce some missing documents.

“Most of them promised to return with the documents, but they did not come back to submit them before the panel closed its sitting”, the source, who spoke in confidence said.

He, however, said that the governorship panel might clear Fubara to contest in the primary election to reduce tension and backlash.

He said: “Even if he is cleared, he cannot win the primary election because he does not have control of the party structures in the state. The result of the primary election will embarrass him”.

It was gathered that the primary election would be between Chinda and George-Kelly, the two members of the Rainbow Coalition of the FCT Minister, Chief Nyesom Wike.

The source also ruled out Cole from the exercise saying his strong link to a former Transport Minister, Chibuike Amaechi had ruled him out of the APC contest.

The Rainbow Coalition had maintained a firm grip of the Rivers APC in the last primary election conducted by the party.

In the House of Representatives primary election, the party cleared 21 aspirants and disqualified four others linked to the camp of the governor.

All the candidates that emerged after the internal election for the Federal constituencies were members of the coalition.

In the last senatorial primary election, the coalition aspirants such as Felix Obuah, Rivers West; Allwell Onyesoh, Rivers East and Osarosaka Ebenezer, Rivers Southeast emerged as consensus senatorial candidates for the election.

Other non-members of the coalition such as a sitting Senator for Rivers West, Ipalibo Banigo; Ojukaiye Flag-Amachree, Rivers West; Tein Jack-Rich, Rivers West; Chief Tammy Danagogo, Rivers West and Chief Barry Mwara were all disqualified from the contest.

(The Nation)

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