Governor Diri Leads With Wide Margin in Bayesla Guber Election as Collation Continues

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The People’s Democratic Party candidate in Bayelsa State and incumbent governor,  Douye Diri, was leading with 138, 009 votes, while Chief Timipre Sylva of APC trailed with 74, 255 votes in six out of the eight local government areas of the state declared on Sunday.

INEC postponed the collation and announcement of results from the remaining two local governments to noon Monday.

Returning Officer, Farouk Kuta, who is also Vice Chancellor of Federal University, Minna, said the postponement was as a result of the challenges and difficulties in the collation in some of the units in two of the most difficult areas to reach in the state.

In the results released so far, PDP won in five local government areas, while APC won in one.

The local government areas so far announced were Kolokuma/Opokuma, Yenagoa, Ogbia, Sagbama, Nembe, and Ekeremor, while the results from Brass and Southern Ijaw local government areas were yet to be declared before INEC suspended the collation.

According to the results announced so far, PDP scored 37,777 votes while APC got 14,534 votes in Yenagoa while in Kolokuma/Opokuma PDP got 18,465 votes and APC got 5349 votes.

PDP polled 18,435 votes in Ogbia while APC scored 16,319 votes; PDP secured 35,504 votes in Sagbama with APC having 6608 votes; PDP had 23,172 votes in Ekeremor, APC scored 8445 while in Nembe, APC polled 22,248 votes while PDP got 4,556 votes.

Sylva had suffered a huge set back following the cancellation of over 26,000 votes purportedly recorded in Ward 11,12 and 13 of Mini, Ikensi and Oluasiri in Nembe Local Government Area.

The cancellation followed protest by stakeholders, particularly members of PDP, over the alleged hijack of election materials by suspected APC thugs in Nembe-Bassambiri and refusal to allow voters, including supporters of PDP, to cast their votes.

PDP also alleged that most of the votes purportedly recorded by the APC in the area were cooked and were voodoo votes that should be cancelled. The votes from Mini, Ikensi and Oluasiri communities were cancelled after the INEC officials reviewed the PDP arguments.

Meanwhile, there was a massive protest at the headquarters of the commission by PDP stakeholders, calling for cancellations of results in Nembe and Brass local government areas of the Bayelsa East Senatorial District. While the protest was going on, reports came that a PDP supporter was hacked to death by suspected APC supporters in Brass Local Government Area.

The middle aged man, identified as George Sibo, was reportedly hacked down in the afternoon after he was attacked by a mob.

Some eyewitnesses claimed the deceased, a supporter of the PDP, was attacked at the Governorship Election Collation Centre at the local government area headquarters when results for some wards in Constituency 2 were being submitted.

When contacted by our reporter, the Bayelsa State lawmaker representing Brass Constituency-one, Dr. Daniel Charles, condemned the gruesome murder by people he described as desperate power seekers and urged security agents to immediately arrest and prosecute perpetrators of the dastardly act.

The deceased, popularly called “Kobo-Kobo”, was said to be an indigene of Twon-Brass and aide to the Brass Local Government Chairman, Hanson Alabo-Karika.

In a related development, the Bayelsa State chapter of PDP accused Sylva in the alleged hostage-taking of an officials of INEC in Twon-Brass, headquarters of Brass Local Government Area.

The party, in a statement issued by its publicity secretary, Ebiye Ogoli, alleged that the APC candidate stormed the INEC office on the Brass Island yesterday in a bid to manipulate the result of the governorship election in the local government area.

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