Ikpeazu out, Otti in as Abia governor

Okezie Ikpeazu, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the April 2015 Abia state governorship election, has been removed as governor.

Delivering judgement on the election petition, the court declared Alex Otti (pictured) of the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) as winner of the election, and ordered that he be sworn in.

Ikpeaze has 21 days to appeal the judgment to the supreme court.

Ikpeazu was declared winner of the election on April 26, after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said he polled 264,713 to defeat Otti, who polled 180,882 votes.

Earlier on April 12, Benjamin Ozumba, the returning officer for Abia, had announced that there were irregularities in nine local government areas (LGAs) and subsequently declared the election inconclusive. Back then, Ikpeazu had polled about 248, 459 votes while Otti had 406 votes, making a difference of 83,053 votes, while 177,000 votes were cancelled – which was more than the vote difference between the top candidate and his leading challenger.

This had necessitated a supplementary election on April 25 in Aba north, Aba south, Ikwuano, Ohiafia, Osisioma, Ugwunagbo, Umuahia north, Umuahia south and Umunneochi.

Otti challenged Ikpeazu’s victory, but the tribunal dismissed it for lacking in merit. In an 85-minute judgment delivered by Usman Bwala, chairman of the panel, the tribunal said that the petitioners, Otti and APGA, did not prove “beyond doubt”, their claim to have won the election.

Bwala said that the petitioners had on the one hand urged the court to nullify the election on grounds that it was marred by irregularities and massive fraud, and on the other hand sought that they should be declared winners of the same election. He said the petitioners reckoned with the card reader as a means of accreditation during the election but failed to countenance with the voter register.

Otti, the immediate past group managing director of Diamond Bank Plc, is an alumnus of the Harvard Business School. He is on the board of several companies and is also on the board of two Nigerian universities.