BREAKING: INEC Announces Cancellation Of February 25 Election
By People’s Voice Nigeria | News
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared that there was no winner in the February 25 National Assembly Election in Doguwa and Tudunwada Federal Constituencies.
Alhassan Doguwa, Majority Leader of the House of Representatives and candidate for the All Progressives Congress (APC), was initially declared the winner of the election.
However, the electoral umpire delisted his name from the representatives-elect and failed to issue him a certificate of return.
The commission had said he was declared the winner of the election under duress.
This followed the arrest of Doguwa in connection with the violence that broke out in the constituency during the collation of the election.
At least two people were killed when a secretariat of the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP) was set ablaze while in the area.
The police had arraigned the ranking lawmaker at a magistrate’s court, which remanded him in prison.
Doguwa, on the other hand, was granted N500 million bail and barred from voting on Saturday.
The returning officer for the election, Professor Ibrahim Adamu Yakasai, announced the new development in Doguwa’s constituency on Wednesday.
Yakasai said that INEC will conduct supplementary elections in the affected units to determine the winner of the February 25 Doguwa/Tudun Wada Federal Constituency poll.
According to Yakasai, the commission had reviewed the initial results that were allegedly announced by him under duress. He stated that INEC, in compliance with the provisions of the electoral act, had reviewed the results.
Announcing the reviewed results, he stated that “the reviewed election results stand as follows: APC 39,732, NNPP 34,798; PDP 7,091.” He also explained that there were cancellations of results in 13 polling units.
He added that “the total number of votes domiciled in the polling units that were cancelled had submerged the margin of votes difference cast in favour of the duo of APC and NNPP.”
He further explained that the total number of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) collected in the 13 polling units that were cancelled stood at 6,917, as against the over 4,000-vote margin between the APC and NNPP.
