INEC declares PDP candidate, Fintiri winner of Adamawa Guber Poll

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Tuesday announced the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Ahmadu Fintiri as the winner of the supplementary governorship election in Adamawa State.

The state returning officer, Mohammed Mele who made the announcement said Fintiri, who is the incumbent governor of the state, scored a total of 430,861 votes to defeat the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Aisha Binani Dahiru, who got 396,788 votes.

In last Saturday’s rerun, Fintiri, the candidate of the PDP, polled 9,337 votes, beating Dahiru of the APC, who scored 6,513 votes.

The announcement by the INEC at 5:49 p.m. on Tuesday put an end to the controversy that earlier attended the conduct of the election in the state.

The electoral umpire had declared the March 18 election as inconclusive and later slated a supplementary election for last Saturday.

However, on Sunday, as collation was underway, the state’s Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Hudu Yunusa Ari, prematurely declared Dahiru the winner, contrary to the provisions of the Electoral Act.

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Incidentally, results had been declared for only 10 of the 20 local government areas (LGAs) in the supplementary poll, which indicated Fintiri was leading, having won in seven LGAs next to Binani’s three.

The declaration by Ari was quickly followed by an acceptance speech by the APC candidate.

However INEC declared the announcement as null and void and suspended collation of results.