Presidential Poll: Imo, Rivers results were manipulated – Yiaga Africa

Yiaga Africa has said the results of Saturday’s presidential election from Imo and Anambra are inconsistent with its projections for the states.

This is contained in its post-election statement titled, ‘The 2023 presidential elections are once again a missed opportunity: INEC must be fundamentally reformed’.

It was jointly signed by Dr. Aisha Abdullahi, for Chair Watching The Vote; and Samson Itodo, Executive Director Yiaga Africa.

They said the results announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) were manipulated.

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“The state-level presidential results for Imo and Rivers are inconsistent with the Yiaga Africa WTV projections for both states. For Rivers, INEC announced 231,591 votes for APC or 44.2 percent; 175,071 for LP or 33.4 percent; and 88,468 for PDP or 16.9 percent.

“This is in sharp contrast to the Yiaga Africa WTV estimates for Rivers which are: APC 21.7 percent ±5.0 percent; for LP 50.8 percent ±10.6 percent; and PDP 22.2 percent ±6.5 percent.

“For Imo, INEC announced 66,406 for APC or 14.2 percent; 360,495 for LP or 77.1 percent; and 30,234; for PDP or 6.5 percent. Again, this is at variance with the Yiaga Africa WTV estimates for Imo which are: APC 5.1 ±2.3 percent; LP 88.1 percent ±3.8 percent; and PDP 5.7 percent ±2.3 percent.”

The organisation said based on reports from 97 percent of its sampled polling units (PUs), the All Progressives Congress (APC) had higher votes.

They said, “Based on reports from 97 percent (1,453 of 1507) of sampled polling units, Yiaga Africa’s statistical analysis shows that the APC should receive between 34.4 percent and 37.4 percent of the vote, LP should receive between 24.2 percent and 28.4 percent of the votes, the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) should receive between 4.6 percent and 6.4 percent of the vote, People’s Democratic Party (PDP) should receive between 28.3 percent and 31.1 percent of the vote, while no other political party should receive more than 0.3% of the vote.”

The report recommended that INEC should clarify the inconsistencies in some of the results, especially from Rivers and Imo states; extend voting hours to 5:00pm in subsequent elections; as well as sustain the uploads of PU results form EC 8A on its IReV portal.