‘Over voting’: APC asks INEC to cancel Bauchi governorship election

The All Progressives Congress (APC) has asked the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to cancel the Bauchi governorship election due to the alleged “overvoting” in some polling units.

Bala Mohammed, governor of Bauchi, polled 525,280 votes to defeat Sadique Abubakar of the APC, who had 432,272 votes.

Following the conclusion of the election, the APC in Bauchi alleged that there was over-voting in some polling units in six LGAs.

Rabiu Garba, legal adviser to the party in the state, said INEC should annul the election because it was not in line with the law.

In a protest letter to INEC dated March 19th, Garba said there were irregularities in Alkaleri, Kirfi, Toro, Warji, Ningi, and Zaki LGAs in the state.

Also, in a statement on Monday, Felix Morka, spokesperson of the APC, alleged that there was malpractice in the strongholds of the party’s candidate.

“Extensive cancellations of polling units results in APC Candidate’s strongholds were made without valid justification, except to depress his vote count and give undue advantage to the PDP candidate, the incumbent Governor, Bala Abdulkadir Mohammed,” Morka said.

“Specifically in Alkaleri LGA, APC polling units’ agents were chased away by PDP thugs who took control of affected polling units and thumb-printed ballot papers without BVAS accreditation, and results were gratuitously awarded and written up without voting, as mandated by law.

“The bogus ‘result’ in the same Alkaleri LGA with recorded and verifiable over-voting, and in which INEC’s returning officer was molested and threatened at gunpoint to sign the “result” sheet was irregularly collated and used in the declaration of the final result of the election in the state.

“The APC rejects the invented election figures and INEC’s declaration of the governor-elect in Bauchi state, and calls on INEC to cancel the election in the aforementioned LGAs that were characterized by over-voting, destruction of electoral materials, harassment, intimidation, and widespread violence and other irregularities in line with its power to review the declaration of the result within seven days under section 65 of the Electoral Act.”