By Abdallah el-Kurebe, Editor
Governor Aminu Tambuwal has said that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) would challenge the decision of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to declare the Saturday governorship election inconclusive.
It could be recalled that although Tambuwal polled 489,558 while his opponent of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Alhaji Aliyu polled 486,145, the state collation/returning officer, Prof. Fatima Batul Muktar declared the election inconclusive.
She posited that she could not declare a winner because the margin of win of 3,413 was far below the 75,403 cancelled votes recorded from 136 polling units.
However, addressing news men at the Government House on Monday, Tambuwal, relying Section 179(2) of the Constitutional and INEC guidelines, faulted INEC’s decision saying that “results of election where there is over-voting can only be scored zero and not be cancelled as INEC did in some polling units
“From our records, the problem in most of the polling units was over-voting and not any other reason. More so, INEC has not communicated to us to tell us reasons for cancellation of votes in each of the 136 polling units.
“The doctrine of votes margin as applied to Sokoto state is strange to our constitution and the electoral act. The law requires majority of votes and 25 percent of votes cast in two-third majority of states of the federation,” Tambuwal said.
“Why was this technical reason of margin difference not applied in Osun and Ekiti elections,’ he asked while calling on “INEC to come out boldly and do the needful by declaring the winner. I believe that we won the election. INEC and its officials have their names to protect by doing the right thing at the right time.”
While commending security agencies for supporting INEC to conduct violence-free elections, Tambuwal also appealed to PDP supporters for more support when the rerun is scheduled.