The candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Godwin Obaseki has been declared the winner of the Edo State governorship election by the Independent National Electoral Commission on Thursday.
Obaseki polled 319,483 votes out of 613, 244 votes cast on Wednesday. His closest challenger Osagie Ize-Iyamu of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) got a total of 253,173.
The total valid votes cast in the election stood at 582, 299 while 30, 945 were rejected.
The PDP rejected the result, saying it did not reflect the wish of the electorate. But the chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Edo chapter, described the rejection of the state governorship election results by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as an act of a bad loser.
Edo State chairman of PDP, Dan Orbih, said at a press conference on Thursday that the result “fabricated and a pre-determined” by INEC and the Edo State Government.
Orbih said that the results as they were being announced by the INEC, were at a complete variance with what the party got from it agents and independent observers.
He alleged that the two-week extension of the poll by the electoral body was to allow for more time to perfect the manipulation of the process.
“You will recall that our state Publicity Secretary had briefed the press less than 48 hours to the elections on what is playing out now.
“If you go by the results that were announced at the polling units and wards across the state, it shows that PDP would have won by over 30,000 votes.
“What INEC is announcing is clearly different from what we got from our agents and independent observers in the 192 wards and over 2,000 units across the state.
“We are rejecting these results as they were being announced by INEC and we are coming out early enough to make this known,” he said.
