After long hours of suspense, the Abia State INEC collation and returning officer, Prof. Benjamin Ugwumba, yesterday declared the governorship elections in the state inconclusive.Prof. Ugwumba, who praised the election exercise as a testimony of the resilience of Nigeria’s electoral process hinged his decision on the high number of cancelled votes, which doubled the difference between the votes polled by the candidate of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu and his closest rival from the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).

According to Prof. Ugwumba, this result failed to meet the electoral regulations, since Dr. Ikpeazu polled 248, 459 votes against Dr. Otti’s 165,406 votes, which represented a margin of 83,053 votes. “From the figure, it was apparent that the margin of the votes was lower than 179,224, the number of registered voters, where election did not hold or cancelled.There was therefore no winner,” the collation officer said. Also in the election contested by 11 candidates and characterised by pockets of protests caused  by the earlier cancellation of elections in three local  councils and its subsequently reversal, the All Progressives Congress candidate, Ayim Nyerere polled 10,065 votes to trail behind Ikpeazu and Otti.The APGA candidate also won in nine out of the I7 local councils against eight local councils won by Ikpeazu, the PDP candidate. Total number of votes cast was 43,0454 of which 8,893 was rejected leaving 43,0461 as total valid votes.

Before the declaration of the election results, there was tension in the state following the outcome of the elections, which process and conduct had generated a lot of concern for residents.There was however heavy security presence in and around Umuahia, the state capital in anticipation of any breakdown of laws and order. Total number of registered voters in the state was 1217632, while the total number of accredited voters was 470900 representing 38,67 percent of voters turn out.


http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/2015/04/inec-declares-taraba-abia-gov-polls-inconclusive/

Peee Deee Peee!!! Its Magic

But come to think of it, APGA is PDP feeder team so they should see this as a family affair methinks. No need to quarell, protest or fight

Willie Obiano learnt the hard way with NASS elections that "it is not love but the desire for a clean mouth that makes the crocodile open its mouth wide for the birds to peck at" hence he protected APGA in the SHOA elections like a hen protects its chicks from predators

PDP has no regard for APGA and the way I see it, Otti and APGA have lost this except the tribunal will be ready to do a proper job.

Potential FP

I know the other parties aside APC in the SE states were courting political disaster when they were encouraging their voters to vote PDP in the Presidential elections and their own parties in other elections.....

The gap is wide though...i don't see how otti can recover from this

asha80:
The gap is wide though...i don't see how otti can recover from this

you are right. The gap is just too much even if election is held there wont be more than 50% turn out of register voters which is less than 80,000 votes gap.
Otti only hope is to go to the tribunal and get the election cancel.