Imo Guber Poll: Ohakim, Okorocha in Close Race

Posted by admin Governors, Imo, Latest Politics, State News Friday, May 6th, 2011

INEC suspends election in Oguta || As the collation of the results for the Imo supplementary poll continues today, the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Owelle Rockas Okorocha, and his closest rival, Governor Ikedi Ohakim of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), appeared to be running neck-to-neck, going by the results collated at the polling units as at the time of going to press.

But having cleared all the polling units in Orji ward where election started earlier, the APGA candidate seemed to have had upper hand in the final results. It became obvious that the final results of the poll would be announced this morning.

The development came just as the Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) put on hold, the supplementary poll in Oguta local government area following a protest by the people of the area over the late arrival of electoral materials.

The protesters, believed to be supporters of APGA, had claimed that, with the late arrival of materials around 1.30 pm, the election would run into night hours, thus creating room for manipulations.

They also alleged that officials of the state government in the area had begun thumb-printing of fake ballot papers ahead of the poll in favour of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party(PDP) in their houses.

When the information was made available to the supervisory resident electoral commissioner in charge of the election, Mr.Aniedi Ikowa, he led other INEC officials to address the issue.

Ikowai, who addressed the protesters, informed them that the commission would take decision for Oguta in the next 24 hours.

Meanwhile, all the sensitive materials for Oguta local government area have been taken back to Owerri office of the commission.

But the APGA candidate had continued to maintain a lead over the incumbent governor, Ikedi Ohakim.

Results emanating from Orji indicated that APGA had won in all the polling units in the ward.

As at the time of filing this report, jubiliation had begun in most parts of Orji.

Meanwhile, collation of results is ongoing in Mbaitoli, Ngor-Okpala and Ohaji-Egbema where election took place under a secured atmophere irrespective of the late arrival of materials.

-Vanguardwp_posts