Politics

INEC cancels 11 Kogi polling units results over violence, BVAS

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has cancelled the results of 11 polling units in Kogi State over violence and failure of a presiding officer to operate the BVAS correctly.

The results of 10 polling units were cancelled in Ofu Local Government Area due to activities of political thugs, and a polling unit in Yagba East LGA over ineptness of a presiding officer.

The collation officer for Yagba LGA, Dr Alhassan Abdulrahaman, on Sunday announced the cancellation in the area while presenting the results to the state collation officer, Prof. Wahab Egbewale, SAN, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ilorin.

Abdulrahaman had barely finished his presentation when Egbewale asked him whether any result was cancelled in the area and he answered in the affirmative.

“Yes, sir; we do have cause to cancel some results in Yagba East Local Government during last Saturday’s presidential and National Assembly elections.

“At Unit 006 of Ward 10, we have no option but to cancel the results of that particular unit on a simple reason that the presiding officer didn’t know how to operate the BVAS issued to her for the exercise.

“It looks as if she wasn’t trained for the job because we tried to help her but she couldn’t pick up. We were so amazed.

“At that point, we had no option than to cancel the result of that very unit,” Abdulrahaman said.

The collation officer for Ofu LGA, Prof. Abdullahi Musa-Yusuf, while presenting his results, said the results of 10 units was cancelled due to activities of political thugs.

Musa-Yusuf said the political thugs invaded the affected units in Itobe and Ayaji wards and packed away the election materials, a situation he said disrupted the election in those units.

He disclosed that more than 6,600 votes in those units were cancelled.

The results of 14 out of 21 Local Government Areas of Kogi State were received by the Prof Egbewale-led team at the Kogi collation centre, including, Bassa, Idah, Igalamela-Odolu, Umala, Okehi, and Olama-Boro.

Dekina, Adavi, and Ibaji LGAs, whose results could not tally, were asked to go and tidy up and return on Monday to represent theirs.

Egbewale, thereafter, thanked all stakeholders including patties’ agents, security operatives, observers, journalists, and INEC officials and adjourned the collation to 11 a.m. on Monday, February 27 for continuation.

The Star