The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared Chukwuma Soludo of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) the winner of the November 6 governorship election in Anambra State.
INEC had suspended collation of results late Sunday night and declared the exercise inconclusive following the commission’s inability to conduct of election in Ihiala local government area for security reasons.
However, a supplementary poll was held yesterday, Tuesday, November 9 amidst tight security
Soludo polled a total of112,229 votes to defeat his closest rival, Valentine Ozigbo of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who scored 53, 807 to emerge second.
Andy Uba of the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate got a total of 43,285 votes to emerge the third position.
Ifeanyi Ubah of the Young Progressive Party (YPP) came fourth with 21,261 votes.
Ubah also won in one local government, same as Ozigbo, with Soludo winning in the remaining 19 local governments.
The returning officer for the election and vice chancellor of the University of Calabar, Prof Florence Banku-Obi, announced the result of the poll in the early hours of Wednesday at INEC headquarters in Awka.
Announcing the final result, Banku-Obi noted that after adding up the results collated from Ihiala, Soludo continued his lead in the election.
She said Soludo won in 19 of the 21 local government areas of the state.
The returning officer listed the areas where Soludo won to include; Dunukofia, Awka South, Oyi, Anaocha, Ayamelum, Anambra East, Idemili South and Onitsha South.
She also stated that the APGA candidate won in Njikoka, Orumba South, Onitsha North, Idemili North, Ekwusigo, Aguata, and Nnewi South, Orumba North and Ihiala local government areas.
The PDP candidate won in Ogbaru with 3,445 votes, APGA scored second while APC came third in the same council.
YPP’s Ubah won in his home local government, Nnewi North, in spite of coming a distant fourth in the overall score card with 21,261 votes.
The returning officer, who is the Vice Chancellor of the University of Calabar, said: “Prof. Chukwuma Soludo having scored the highest number of valid votes was declared winner of the election.”
Obi said total number of valid votes was 241,523, while 8,108 were void.
She had earlier stated that Anambra with a total number of 2,466,638 registered voters only had a total of 253, 388 accredited voters for the election which began on November 6 and was extended to November 9, 2021.
Soludo is expected to be sworn in, in March 2022, when the tenure of the outgoing governor, Mr. Willie Obiano, expires.
