Governors Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto state and his counterpart in Benue State, Samuel Ortom have been re-elected for second term in office under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), even as the governor of Plateau State, Simon Lalong was also re-elected on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
The three governors were first voted into office for four years, from 2015 on the platform of the APC, but the Sokoto and Benue governors defected to PDP midway into their first tenure.
Governor Tambuwal survived the tough challenge of Ahmed Aliyu and his godfather Senator Aliyu Wamakko of the APC to win the re-election.
He polled 512,002 votes, while his APC challenger got 511660 votes.
After the results from 21 LGAs were tallied, Tambuwal led with 2057 votes, after polling 506,545 votes. Aliyu, his APC challenger had 504,488 votes.
However, the margin of APC’s victory in Kebbe was not enough to change the final picture.
APC polled 7177 votes while PDP got 5457 votes. Overall in the supplementary votes, APC got 25,515 votes while Governor Tambuwal of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) polled 22,444 votes.
The returning officer Professor Fatima Mukhtar, vice chancellor of Federal University of Dutse is set to announce the final result for all the 22 LGAs.
That was even as governor Ortom polled 434,473 votes to defeat his closest rival, Emmanuel Jime of the APC, who polled 345,155 votes.
The INEC Returning Officer for the election, Prof. Sabastine Maimako, declared the result on Sunday in Makurdi.
He said that Ortom “having polled the highest number of votes at this election is hereby declared winner.”
Maimako said the total registered votes were 2,471,894, total accredited voters were 858,947 while total valid votes stood at 830,954.
He said that total rejected votes were 15,268 while the margin of lead between the winner and his closest rival was 89,318 votes.
Meanwhile, governor Lalong of APC gathered 595,582 votes to win, with his closest rival, Jeremiah Useni, a retired Army General who was the candidate of the PDP, polling 546,813 votes.
Profesor Richard Kimbir, the Returning Officer, said that valid votes were 1,159,954, with the rejected votes standing at 16,188, while the total votes cast was 1,176,142,” he said.
The margin of victory between Lalong of APC and Useni of the PDP is 48,769 votes.
