by the INEC Returning officer in the state, Prof Ebidope Obe can be
said to have been characterized with melo drama.
The collation exercise which started at about 11am on Sunday morning
was going on peacefully with no doubt about results from the LGAs
until those from Ezinihitte LGA were brought in by the returning
officers, who were mostly females.
The drama started when APC and other party Agents insisted that the
results from Ezinihitte LGA be cancelled due to alleged
irregularities. But INEC ordered that the returning officers should
enter their collated results into the INEC result sheets in a secluded
place under the watchful eyes of party Agents and some security
personnel to avoid pressure on the officials.
But the results were later discovered to have exceeded the number of
accredited voters and distributed PVC in the areas which INEC later
reviewed and gave the accurate results in favour of PDP.
The same scenario also played out when the electoral officers from Oru
East presented their own results which were said to be marred with
incorrect figures that also led INEC to review it and cancel some
results from the area.
Unconfirmed report however indicates that the returning officers from
Oru-East after integration by INEC alleged that they were influenced
by APC chieftains in the Area to doctor the results in their favour.
With all those developments the PDP and other party Agents at the INEC
office expressed concern with the turnout of events and started
calling for cancellation of the entire guber results.
However, later at about Sunday midnight, Prof Obe after studying the
number of cancelled votes came to the conclusion that they were higher
than the margin with which the APC candidate was leading, which was
absurd, and therefore declared the result inconclusive.
The state returning officer said that 144,715,(one hundred and forty
four thousand, seven hundred and fifteen)votes were cancelled, which
was massive and ordered that elections would be held in some Booths in
twenty three(23) Local Government Areas in the state to determine the
authentic winner of the Governorship election within stipulated
period.
Imo INEC announced that the election will hold on Saturday April 25,
2015 according to the 2011 electoral Act, for the winner to emerge.
Election will not hold in only four LGAs. They are Ahiazu, Owerri
Municipal, Ideato South and North LGAs.
--Trumpeta
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