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Concede Defeat To PDP Candidate, APC Chieftain, Others Tells Adamawa Gov

"The only honourable thing to do is for my party's candidate, Governor Bindow, to concede and give peace a chance."

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Jibrilla Bindow, Governor of Adamawa State, and candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has been urged to concede defeat to “save the state unnecessary trouble”.

The governorship election in the state was declared inconclusive by Professor Andrew Haruna, the Returning Officer for Adamawa State, who said the number of cancelled votes was higher than the margin between the two leading contestants.

However, in separate appeals, elders in the state insist that Ahmed Umar Fintiri, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), won the election.

Babachir David Lawan, former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), and a chieftain of the APC, said: "The only honourable thing to do is for my party's candidate, Governor Bindow, to concede and give peace a chance. The next election is only four years away, Bindow can go back to the drawing board and launch himself back; therefore let's not allow elections to cause trouble between brothers.”

Boni Haruna, former Governor and one-time minister, said: "We have reliably gathered that the total number of Permanent Voter Cards collected in the 44 polling units is 31,027, a figure that would not reverse Fintiri's winning lead, even after the supplementary elections in the 44 units. This is just as the registered voters in the PUs are now only 34,101.”

"We have gleaned from INEC records that 34,101 is actually the number of registered voters in the affected polling units, as against 40,988 declared by the state returning officer,” Abdullahi Prambe, a leading political figure in the state, said.

The results of the elections as announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) shows that Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri, the PDP candidate, won the elections by 367,472 votes against 334,995 votes polled by the APC candidate.

Speaking on the elections, Haruna continued: "The margin of win by the PDP candidate is 32,476 votes. While we were waiting for the outright declaration of Fintiri as to have won by a clear majority, we were taken aback with INEC's declaration of the elections as inconclusive, on the grounds that the margin of win by PDP (32,476) was less than 40,988 in 44 polling units where the elections did not hold or were cancelled."

"The electoral body relied on Sections 26 and 53 of the electoral act and regulations and guidelines, page 17, paragraph C, to justify its actions. We wish to state that the action by the electoral body to declare Adamawa election as inconclusive is not only absurd, but untenable, most unfortunate and unacceptable.

"We wish to state or note that the National Chairman had told the world that elections starts and end at polling units. It is our understanding that if elections were cancelled at polling units or wards collation centres, it stands cancelled. We therefore find it curious for the electoral body to resurrect the issue of election results that have been cancelled at the polling units to justify its action of declaring the governorship elections as inconclusive at the level of state collation or declaration of results.

"The position of the electoral body ordering a supplementary election on the basis that the margin of win was less than the number of cancelled results in the 44 polling units was untenable. This is because we have been able to establish that the number of PVCs collected in the 44 polling units was 31,027; these are the only eligible voters if there is going to be a rerun.

"The 31,027 figure is far less than the number of registered voters that INEC relied upon to decline declaring PDP winner of the governorship elections."