The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has made public the 18 states, including the Federal Capital Territory where supplementary elections will hold on Saturday, March 23.
In a document released by the commission, supplementary governorship polls will hold in five states including Bauchi where the exercise would be held in 14 local government areas.
In Benue, the exercise will hold in 22 local government areas, nine, 29, and 22 local government areas in Plateau, Kano and Sokoto states respectively.
“In Adamawa state, elections will hold in Nassarawa-Binyeri state Constituency of Mayo Belwa local government area, which was countermanded as required by the electoral act following the death of a candidate on the eve of the governorship and state assembly elections held on 9th March 2019.
“Supplementary election will also hold in Uba/Gaya state constituency in Hong local government area,” it said.
IN Bauchi, INEC said it will proceed with supplementary elections in Bauchi State on Saturday.
The commission said a court order barring it from collating and announcing results only applied to Tafawa Balewa local government area of the state.
“It should, however, be noted that the litigation and consequential order only affects the collation of results for the governorship election in Tafawa Balewa local government area,” it said.
It would be recalled that the result of Tafawa Balewa local government was not announced after the March 9 governorship election because the result sheet was initially torn by thugs.
Although the INEC official at the local government later collated the result on a separate result sheet, it was rejected at the state collation centre.
INEC said it had since generated the results from the various polling units and wards in the local government and was set to announce it.
But the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its governorship candidate, Mr. Mohammed Abubakar, secured a court injunction barring INEC from proceeding to announce the result of the local government.
INEC has since said it will obey the court order.
But the commission’s spokesperson, Mr. Festus Okoye, said supplementary elections earlier scheduled for Saturday will continue in other parts of Bauchi were elections were cancelled or did not hold.
“Consequently the supplementary election will proceed as scheduled on Saturday the 23rd day of March 2019 in the other 15 local government areas of Bauchi State as well as in the Kirifi local government constituency election in Kirifi local government area.”
The commission also said it had taken steps to vacate the court order on Tafawa Balewa local government.
“While the commission has complied with the policy to obey all court orders, in defence of the rule of law, it has also taken urgent steps to vacate the order and dismiss the action,” he said.
The governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Bala Mohammed, was leading the APC candidate before the Bauchi election was declared inconclusive.
The states where the run-off polls are scheduled are:
1. Bauchi (one LGA, 1,111 voters)
2. Bayelsa (three LGAs, 58,270 voters)
3. Benue (nine LGAs, 91,141 voters)
4. Ebonyi (three LGAs, 45,905 voters)
5. Edo (one LGA, 6,764 voters)
6. Ekiti (one LGA, 2,244 voters)
7. Kaduna (one LGA, 7,514 voters)
8. Adamawa (two LGAs, 49,588 voters)
9. Kano (one LGA, 40,821 voters)
10. Kogi (three LGAs, 24,637 voters)
11. Imo (five LGAs, 118,372 voters)
12. Lagos (one LGA, 12,711 voters)
13. Nasarawa (four LGAs, 43,874 voters)
14. Osun (one LGA, 2,485 voters)
15. Plateau (one LGA, 5,501 voters)
16. Sokoto (two LGAs, 24,492 voters)
17. Taraba (two LGAs, 19,912)
18. FCT (four LGAs, 29,796 voters)
