Romanus Ugwu and Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
The All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, President Muhammadu Buhari, has polled a total number of 2.6 million votes in six states declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) National Collation Centre, at the International Conference Centre, Abuja.
President Buhari won in states like Kwara, Nasarawa, Osun, Ekiti, Gombe, Kogi states out of the eight states the commission yesterday declared the presidential results, defeating the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidates, Atiku Abubakar, who scored two million votes.
According to the declared results from eight states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), the PDP presidential candidate m Atiku, won in states like Kogi, Ondo and the FCT to trail the incumbentm relegating other political parties to mere participant observers.
Although PDP agent, Osita Chidoka had objected to the results from Kogi state on the grounds that it was not a reflection of the votes, the INEC chairman did not stop accepting the announced results.
Declaring the presidential results from Ekiti, the Collation Officer and Vice Chancellor, University of Ibadan, Idowu Olayinka, revealed that while the APC candidate got a total number of 219,231 votes, the PDP candidate polled 154,031 votes.
Olayinka also disclosed that the total number of Vote Cast stood at 393,709, total valid votes 381,132, while the total invalid votes are 12,577.
Similarly, the Collation Officer for Osun state and Vice Chancellor, University of Lagos, Olutoyin Ogundipe, equally declared the APC candidate won with a total number of 347,634, slightly above the PDP candidate with a total number of 337,377 votes.
Ogundipe explained that the total number of registered voters in the state stood at 1,674, 129, accredited voters; 732,984, total votes cast; 731,882, while valid votes are 714,682 and invalid votes 17,200.
Announcing the FCT results, the collation officer, Mohammed Suleiman declared that while the PDP candidate polled 259,997 votes, the APC got 152,224 votes, adding that out of the 1,335,015 total registered voters, those accredited are 467,784, total votes cast 451,408, while the rejected votes stood at 27,457.
Atiku also won the presidential election result in Ondo state with a total number of 275,901 votes relegating the APC candidate with a total 241,769 votes to the second position. The collation officer, Kayode Soremekun, who ran into storm presenting the results, said that out of 1,812,567 registered voters, the total number of votes cast are 568,827, the number of cancelled votes in 71 polling units totaled 42,283.
Giving a breakdown of the result in Abia State, the SCOPE, Chinedu Nwajuba stated that whereas there are 1,793, 861 registered voters, only 361,562 were accredited for the presidential poll. He noted that the PDP and the APC scored 219, 698 and 85, 058 votes respectively, while 21,180 votes were voided.
On Kwara state, the collation officer, Abdullahi Gala, said that the APC led with 308,984 votes, while PDP scored 138,184 votes, explaining that over 3,342 votes in the pulling units across four Local Government Areas (LGAs) were cancelled over cases of sundry electoral infractions.
He further announced that out of the 1,401,895 total registered voters, 489,482 were accredited, while 459,676 validly voted and 26,578 votes were rejected.
Equally announcing the votes scored in Kogi state, the collation officer, Michael Adikwu, said that the APC polled 285,894 votes to defeat the PDP that scored 218,207 votes, explaining that a total number of 89,101 votes in 89 Pulling Units were cancelled outrightly due to hostilities during the exercise.
He said that out of the 1,640,449 registered voters, 570,773 voters were accredited while 521,016 valid votes came from 553,496 total votes cast. Similarly, in Gombe, APC won with a very wide margin of 402,961 votes while the PDP got 138,484 votes.
On his part, the SCOPE for Yobe State, Abubakar Musa of the Federal University, Wukari, in his submission stated that out of the 1,365, 913 registered voters in the state, 601,059 voters were accredited for the poll. Musa said the APC garnered 497,914 votes; the PDP scored 50,763 votes, while 4,407 votes were canceled.
Presenting Nasarawa State results, the Academic Provost National Defence Academy (NDA) doubling as the collation officer, Azubuike Sunny Nwankwo, announced that the APC won with the skim margin of 289,903 votes while the PDP trailed with 283,847 votes, explaining that 613,720 voters were accredited out of the 1,509,481 registered voters.
However, political party agents raised objections when the collation officer for Nasarawa announced that a total number of 157,591 votes were cancelled in 86 Polling Units across seven LGAs, protesting that the results are doctored.
Nwankwo had blamed the cancellation on what he called gangsterism and other electoral maleficence, but while reacting INEC chairman, Mahmood Yakubu assured that the result of the Presidential elections in the state will be looked at due to complaints of huge number of cancellation.