Nigeria’s Election Results Trickle In
Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Sunday began to announce preliminary results of Saturday’s historic elections.
The West African nation’s electoral body Sunday said Bola Tinubu, the candidate for the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) won small in southwestern Ekiti state with Atiku Abubakar of the main opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) coming in second.
INEC’s announcement came amid widespread voting delays that happened on Saturday and early accusations of attempts to manipulate ballot counts by presidential candidates.
In response the electoral body said it was experiencing problems with uploading results to its IRex data page but emphasized that these were “technical hitches” and that there was no risk of tampering.
“The commission wishes to assure Nigerians that the challenges are not due to any intrusion or sabotage of our systems,” read a statement released by INEC.
“It is important to avoid statements and actions that can heat up the polity at this time,” added the statement.
Despite INEC’s statement, the PDP’s presidential candidate insisted that the electoral body upload results after accusing some state governors of trying to compromise the election.
“It will be a disservice to Nigerians and a negation to democracy for anyone to subvert the will of the people as freely expressed in their votes of yesterday,” said Abubakar.
Julius Abure, the chairman of the opposition Labor Party that is led by Peter Obi, released a statement where he accused INEC of failing to upload results from parts of Lagos and southern Delta State to help the ruling party’s Tinubu.
“Information reaching me has it that in Lagos, they have refused to upload the results for the presidential election, they have uploaded that of the Senate and House of Representatives but the presidential, they have refused,” read the statement.
“They are using the police to drive our agents and supporters out of the place. And they said that they have firm instruction from INEC headquarters not to upload,” added the statement.
Yiaga Africa, a non-profit organization focused on promoting democracy in the West African nation said it was “deeply concerned with the delay” in results.
Burna Boy, a Nigerian Grammy Award winning musician called on INEC to immediately address the concerns echoed by citizens and presidential candidates.
“Let Nigeria decide O! @inecnigeria,” tweeted Burna Boy, adding, “no try any result magic.”
Source: VOA
