PDP’s Bala Mohammed, Samuel Ortom win in Bauchi, Benue States

The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate in Saturday’s rerun election in Bauchi and Benue States, Senator Bala Mohammed and Dr. Sam Ortom respectively are just few inches away from being declared winners, collated ballots have shown.
Both candidates, after Saturday’s exercise increased their leads over their APC opponents.
In Bauchi, Mohammed garnered 6,376 votes in the just concluded re-run election, as against 5,117 votes scored by incumbent governor Mohammed Abdullahi of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Result of the re-run was announced in Bauchi on Sunday by the governorship election Returning Officer, Prof. Mohammed Kyari, Vice Chancellor of Modibbo Adama University of Technology, Yola.
Kyari, however said he was not in a position to make any pronoumement regarding the overall winner of the governorship election in the state due to the suit before a  Federal High Court, Abuja over the collation of results in Tafawa Balewa Local Government Area.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that outcome of the election in respect of 19 out of the 20 Local Government Areas in the state,  earlier conducted on March 9, indicated that Mohammed polled 469,512 votes while Abubakar scored 465, 453 votes.
With the release of the re-run election result, conducted in 36 polling units across 15 Local Government Areas,  the total votes scored by Mohammed increased to 475,888 votes, while that of Abubakar rose to 470, 570 votes, a difference of 5,318 votes.
With the conclusion of the supplementary elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in the state is awaiting the decision of the Federal High Court  in Abuja on the collation of results of Tafawa Balewa Local Government Area, before determining the governor-elect.
Incumbent governor, Mohammed Abubakar, had dragged INEC to court to challenge the decision of the electoral body directing the continuation of collation of results of the area, having earlier declared same as inconclusive.
Judgement on the matter had  been fixed for Monday, March 25.
Meanwhile, Gov Ortom of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has won in 9 of 13 Local Government Areas (LGA’s) in the supplementary polls held on Saturday.
Results from nine councils will be announced today.
The results of 13 councils as announced by various INEC Collation Officers on Sunday in Makurdi showed Ortom won Agatu, Apa, Ogbadibo, Gwer West, Buruku, Ukum, Kwande, Logo and Ushongo while Mr Emmanuel Jime of the All Progressives Congress (APC) won in Tarka, Otukpo, Makurdi and Ohimini LGA’s.
Ortom polled 144 votes in Agatu as against Jime’s zero vote.
In Apa LGA, the APC candidate polled 176 votes while Ortom’s PDP garnered 296 votes to win the election in the local government area whereas in Otukpo the APC polled 255 votes to defeat PDP with 250 votes.
In Ogbadibo the PDP won with 467 votes while the APC scored 241 votes. In Ohimini APC polled 2,223 as against PDP’s 192 votes.
In Gwer West, APC has 137 votes, PDP 481 votes,
APC polled 550 votes in Makurdi, while PDP got 182 votes. The PDP prevailed in Buriku, winning 515 votes to APC’s 189 votes.
In Tarka, APC polled 409 votes and the PDP 202 votes, while in Logo, APC scored 34 votes to the PDP’s 651 votes.
The results showed that in Ukum, APC got 65 votes, the PDP won 616 votes, while in Kwande, the PDP got 193 votes, leaving the APC with just 3 votes.
In Ushongo LGA, the PDP polled 352 votes to defeat APC with 94 votes.
Before the supplementary election, Ortom had 410,576 votes, while Jime of APC had 329,022 votes.
(NAN)