It’s Official: Buhari wins Rivers LGA with 72k votes, takes three more

The results from Emohua Local Government Area of Rivers State, where President Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC), had 72,745 votes, have been officially recorded, the state collation officer, Aniefiok Essien, has indicated.

The results were accepted amidst controversy and despite protests by opposition party agents.

Mr Essien gave a verdict that the results would be included in the final spreadsheet just before the collation exercise late Monday night.

“We can’t create a separate table for that,” he said when pressured to make a final pronouncement on the case by agents of parties. “I’ll raise it with the INEC chairman. But the way the template is, we can’t have a separate place to say this one is special.”

“So, it (Emohua) will be there,” he said.

Mr Essien had previously said the Emohua results “will be looked into as a special case” after both the Electoral Officer, EO, Kenneth Ita, and the Collation Officer, CO, Pang Enubari, brought the results a third time.

The agents of political parties led by Peoples Democratic Party’s Austin Okpara strenuously protested because the EO had earlier rejected the results and queried how the CO sourced them.

But they later announced a reconciliation when called a second time. When they came a third time, the EO even affirmed that the form containing the results from wards brought by the CO as evidence of collation “is INEC form”.

The two APC agents who made their way into the collation hall when the Emohua brought the exercise under a chaotic atmosphere, said agents of other parties protesting the Emohua results were members of the PDP wearing tags of other parties.

That was after the results came for collation a third time and the state collation officer Mr Essien said they “will be looked into as a special case”.

In the results presented, the APC scored 72,745 votes and the PDP came far behind with 7,148.

Apart from Emohua LGA, Mr Buhari also won three other LGAs, including Opobo/Nkoro (APC – 3,706; PDP – 3,573), Asari Toru (APC- 8,180; PDP – 3,175) and Obua Odua (APC – 42,496; PDP – 20,416) in Rivers State.

But he is still coming behind Mr Atiku in the oil-rich state after results from all the 18 LGAs, where the election process ended conclusively, were collated Monday night.

Mr Abubakar of the PDP won in 14 LGAs. These included Oyigbo (APC – 3520; PDP – 16,102), Omuma (APC – 2494; PDP – 15322), ONELGA (APC – 10996; PDP – 28536), and Eleme (APC – 2412; PDP – 8464). PDP also won Gokana (APC – 9328; PDP – 10276) and Etche (APC – 7163; PDP – 11135).

He also took Governor Nyesom Wike’s Obio Akpor (APC – 6875; PDP – 69981) and party chairman Uche Secondus’ Andoni (APC – 10766; PDP – 72330).

Then, he also had Khana (APC – 5329; PDP – 89843), Ogu Bolo (APC – 2148; PDP – 8221), Tai (APC – 2564; PDP -45049), Degema (APC – 7298; PDP – 14083), Port Harcourt City (APC – 10742; PDP – 46851), and Ahoada East (APC – 4693; PDP – 10612).

Rivers State has 23 LGAs but there were no results collated for the presidential election from five of them: Bonny, Akuku Toru, Okrika, Ikwerre and Ahoada West.

Elections did not hold in Bonny and Akuku Toru LGAs due to violence. In Okrika, Ikwerre and Ahoada West LGAs, the EOs, who did not come with their respective COs, said there was nothing to show election held. They accused “PDP and APC” supporters of shootings and the Nigerian Army of violent disruptions of collation exercise.

The state collation officer, Mr Essien is expected to announce the final results after collation later today.