The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has announced the 2023 presidential election results for Ekiti State.
INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner for Ekiti, Ayobami Salami pronounced the results at the 2023 presidential election collation centre at the International Conference Centre in Abuja.
Salami disclosed that Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) polled 201,494 votes followed by Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who scored 89,554 votes.
Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) gained 11,397 votes while Rabiu Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) got 264 votes.
INEC National Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu said that the commission expects the results of the other 35 states and the Federal Capital Territory and moved the national collation to 11am on Monday, February 27, 2023.
Yakubu remarked earlier that the collation of presidential election results will be done at four levels — first at the 8,889 wards, then at the 774 local government areas, then the state collation officers for the presidential election (SCOPs) at the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory will submit the votes per candidate in Abuja.
Results Viewing Portal Remains “Well-secured”
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has disclosed that its Results Viewing Portal (IReV) has not been sabotaged or compromised, adding that the portal remains “well-secured”.
INEC Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, noted in a statement that the commission is aware of the challenges with the portal, assuring Nigerians that the “outstanding problems” will be resolved as soon as possible.
The IReV and the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) are new technologies introduced by the electoral body for the accreditation and electronic transmission of votes for this year’s polls.
Many party leaders have bitterly complained that INEC officials at the polling units were unable to upload election results to the IReV.
Nonetheless, INEC Commissioner, Okoye, apologized and promised that the glitches will be resolved. He said, “The Commission regrets this setback, especially because of the importance of IReV in our results management process.
“The problem is totally due to technical hitches related to scaling up the IReV from a platform for managing off-season, State elections, to one for managing nationwide general elections. It is indeed not unusual for glitches to occur and be corrected in such situations. Consequently, the Commission wishes to assure Nigerians that the challenges are not due to any intrusion or sabotage of our systems, and that the IReV remains well-secured.”
Festus Okoye
Okoye noted that the technical team was working assiduously to solve all the outstanding problems, and “users of the IReV would have noticed improvements since last night.”
“We also wish to assure Nigerians that results from the Polling Unitcopies of which were issued to political parties, are safe on both the BVAS and the IReV portal. These results cannot be tampered with and any discrepancy between them and the physical results used in collation will be thoroughly investigated and remediated, in line with Section 65 of the Electoral Act 2022.”
Festus Okoye
The statement revealed that while the electoral body fully appreciates the concerns of the public on this situation and welcomes various suggestions that have been received from concerned Nigerians, it is important to avoid statements and actions that can “heat up the polity at this time or promote disaffection towards the Commission.”
“We take full responsibility for the problems and regret the distress that they have caused the candidates, political parties and the electorate,” the statement noted.
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