The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared the Anambra governorship election inconclusive.
This announcement was made in the early hours of Monday, around 12:20 a.m by the state Returning Officer for the election, Florence Obi, the vice-chancellor of the University of Calabar.
According to her, Anambra Election was declared inconclusive since there was no political election in Ihiala Local Government Area which has more than 148,000 enlisted voters
Recall that there was a report that due to security threat, INEC could not deploy voting materials to Ihiala during Saturday’s election.
Addressing the matter, Florence Obi said;
“Based on constitutional consideration and provisions of the Electoral Act as well as the Revised Regulations and Guidelines for the Conduct of Elections issued by the commission, supplementary election is indicated for Ihiala Local Government Area”
Going further, Mrs Obi noted that before a candidate is declared winner, the constitution accommodates him/her to get both the largest number of votes cast and 25 percent of votes cast in at least two-third of the local government areas of the state .
She added;
“Therefore, it is important to complete the election in Ihiala to make this determination.
“Section 179 (3) of the Constitution provides that a rerun election shall take place if no candidate meets the requirement of sub-section 2.
Such a run-off shall be between the candidate with the highest number of votes and one among the remaining candidates who secured a majority of votes in the highest number of local government areas in the state”.
The supplementary election in Ihiala will be conducted on Tuesday, November 9.
Meanwhile, Charles Soludo, the candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), has scored a total of 103,946 votes.
According to the results, he has won the election in 18 out of the 21 local government areas of the state.
Also, His closest rival, Valentine Ozigbo of the Peoples Democratic Party scored 51,322. He won in only one local government area.
CREDIT: PremiumTimes
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