The candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Seyi Makinde, has been declared winner of the Oyo State governorship election.

The PDP candidate won 28 out of the 33 local governments in the state, leaving the All Progressives Congress with only five.

Mr Makinde received 515, 621 votes to defeat his closest rival from the APC, Bayo Adelabu, who polled 357, 982 votes.

The margin of defeat is 157,639 votes.

The African Democratic Congress’ candidate, Olufemi Lanlehin, despite quitting the race to endorse the PDP candidate, came third with 12,375.

Former governor Adebayo Akala, who was the candidate of the Action Democratic Party before he defected to the APC, also received votes totaling 8,664 to come a distant fourth position.

Forty two (42) political parties contested the governorship election, even though many of them dropped their ambition at the last minute to align with either the PDP or the APC.

Their names remained on the ballot, notwithstanding and they received votes.

Violence

Although the governorship election was successfully conducted, it suffered a number of skirmishes, recording two deaths at the last count.

One of the casualties of the election was a serving House of Representatives member, Temitope Olatoye, of Lagelu/Akinyele federal constituency, who was shot dead by political thugs in his ward.

The governorship election also recorded several occurrences of ballot box snatching and violence, resulting in the cancellation of results from some wards and many polling units.

In Irepo local government area, the materials for the entire Ward 3 were burnt by hoodlums and so no results were declared.

The returning officer, Oluwatoyin Temitayo Ogundipe, who is the Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos, while declaring the final results, said Mr Makinde having polled the highest number of votes in the election was returned elected as governor of Oyo State.

Victory locations

Local governments won by the PDP include Ibadan North West, Ibarapa East, Atiba, Kajola, Ido, Lagelu, Iwajowa, Afijio, Orelope, Ibadan North East, Ibadan South East, Ibarapa North, Atisbo, Ibarapa Central, Ogbomoso South, Ibadan North, Egbeda, Itesiwaju, Saki West, Saki East, Oyo West, Oyo East, Oluyole, Olorunsogo! Ona Ara, Akinyele, Iseyin and Ibadan South West local government areas.

The APC candidate won in Orire, Ogooluwa, Surulere, Ogbomoso North, and Irepo local government areas.

Ibadan North local government area delivered the highest number of votes for the PDP with 40,785 votes against the APC which received 18,868 votes there.

Crisis averted

However, the Ibadan South West votes came last because the INEC had to retrieve duplicate copies of the results from security and polling agents after hoodlums set the result sheets from the Ward 12 collation centre on fire.

The PDP won the local government with 34,445 votes against the APC which scored 18,183 votes.

Although the APC agent at the collation centre protested and called for the cancellation of the results, the Resident Electoral Commssioner, Mutiu Agboke, citing electoral guidelines, said the results could be ”regenerated since they were already announced at polling units and declared at the ward collation centre.