5 fake voters arrested in Benue’s supplementary election

Five persons including a pastor’s wife were allegedly apprehended with fake voter cards during the supplementary election in two polling units of Ohimini state constituency on Saturday.

Daily Trust gathered that the arrested suspects who attempted to cast their votes during the exercise were handed over to the police for further action.

But, the Police Public Relation Officer for Benue Command, Catherine Anene, could not confirm the incident at the time of this report, as according to her, the matter had not yet been brought to her knowledge.

It was also learnt that apart from the arrest made at the polling units, the election held peacefully in the disputed areas.

Earlier, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Benue State said that its decision to conduct the supplementary election in Ohimini state constituency followed the sacking of the earlier occupier of the seat by the Court of Appeal.

Daily Trust on Sunday reports that the appellate court had on November 8, last year sacked the Deputy Speaker of the Benue State House of Assembly, Christopher Adaji and ordered fresh election into disputed two polling units of Ohimini constituency.

Adaji had been returned winner of the March 9, 2019 election by INEC with a margin of 397 votes, which was less than 1, 056 votes cancelled in the two polling units in contention

Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) of INEC in Benue State, Nentawe Yilwatda, had informed that only the 16 political parties which appeared on the March 9, 2019 ballot paper would participate in the supplementary election, stressing that the result would be computed together with the earlier election in order for a winner to emerge.

Adaji of PDP had scored a total of 6522 votes in the earlier election which INEC had declared him winner and was followed closely by Musa Alechenu of the APC with 6125 votes.

Yilwatda had said that the areas affected by the cancellation are Agadagba with polling unit in Igbanomaje consisting of 388 registered voters of which 377 collected their Permanent Voters Card (PVC) and Onyagede Icho (Ogoli) area where 663 PVC have been collected out of a total 668 registered voters.

Meanwhile, at the time of sending this report, INEC collation officers; Dr. Emmanuel Agada and Dr. Grace Gberikon for the the two polling units respectively have presented their results at Idekpa, the headquarters of Ohimini LGA while official declaration of the winner by INEC is still being awaited.

The result from Odega polling unit in Onyagede-Icho as presented by Dr. Gberikon showed rejected votes were 20 while APC scored 165, the PDP had 115 while that of Igbanonmaje in Agadagba polling unit as presented by Dr. Agada showed PDP scoring 105 votes and APC 51 votes.