INEC declares Labour Party’s Alex Otti Abia Governor-elect

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The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Wednesday declared the governorship candidate of the Labour Party, Mr. Alex Otti, winner of the March 18 governorship election in Abia State.

The final declaration of the result and return of Otti as elected governor marked the climax of prolonged vote collation dogged by pregnant suspense.

INEC State Returning Officer for the Abia governorship election, Professor Nnenna Oti, who is the Vice-chancellor of the Federal University of Technology Owerri (FUTO) pronounced Oti the Abia governor- elect.

In the final tally, the RO said that the LP governorship flag bearer scored 175, 467 to coast home to victory, dusting to the second position the candidate of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, Sir Okey Ahiwe, who received 88,529 votes.

The candidate of YPP, Enyinnaya Nwafor received came a distant third with 28,972 votes while the APC candidate, HighChiefIkechi Emenike was awarded 24,091 votes to place third.

After the final declaration of the result 11 party agents that were present signed the and collected the result sheet. However the PDP state collation agent stayed away from participating in the resumed collation apparently in protest of the way Obingwa issue was resolved in favour of LP.

The State Collation Agent of APC, Prince Anthony Eze told the State Returning Officer that the result as announced was unacceptable to his party, citing numerous mutilations, falsification and allocation of scores in favour of LP and PDP.

The final declaration of the 2023 Abia governorship poll was held up following the controversy generated by the result from Obingwa Local government.

The LP had alleged that PDP was trying to impose on INEC outrageous vote scores outside the number recorded by the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System(BVAS).

By then, results from 16 of the 17 Abia local governments had been collated and declared at the state collation centre located within the INEC State Office, Ogurube Layout Umuahia. Obingwa

To resolve the impasse the national headquarters of INEC weighed in and directed the State RO to suspend collate of Obingwa votes and promised to send a team to Abia to review the case.

However, the INEC leadership in Abuja changed their mind and halted the earlier plan to send an investigative team to Abia on Tuesday. Instead the electoral umpire opted to carry out the Obingwa vote review at Abuja, citing the tense situation in Abia State.

At the resumed collation on Wednesday, the Administrative Secretary of Abia INEC, Mr. Clement Oha, said BVAS and Form EC8 were relied upon to resolve the Obingwa imbroglio at Abuja.

Abia was really tensed up as the contending parties engaged in recriminations of poll rigging with LP supporters stoking apprehension by alleging that INEC was being pressured to subvert the poll results.

Abia was practically sitting on a tinderbox as hundreds of youths from the opposing LP and PDP camps amassed close to INEC headquarters on daily basis singing and taunting the opposing party as they waited for the final result.