The suspended collation of the Abia State governorship election will resume by 4pm Wednesday at the collation centre located inside the premises of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) office in Umuahia.
Head of Voter Education and Publicity in the state, Mrs. Rebecca Jim, confirmed this to Vanguard on Wednesday.
She said that the Presiding Officer and Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Technology Owerri, FUTO, Professor Nnenna Oti; and the State Administrative Secretary, Clement Oha, who were invited to the INEC headquarters Abuja, over the controversy from the Obingwa results, were on their way back to the state, to complete the process.
Recall that the collation of governorship election results in Abia and Enugu were, on Monday, suspended by INEC following allegations of infractions, especially over-voting in some areas.
While fewer than 27,000 voters were accredited in Obingwa by the Bi-modal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, machines, reports had it that the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, polled over 100,000 votes from the council.
The main opposition Labour Party, LP, which was already leading with over 93, 000 votes from the declared results of 16 out of 17 LGAs in the state, cried foul, alleging that the ‘mystery figures’ were cooked by the ruling party.
While results from 16 LGAs had been formally declared at the INEC Collation Centre, Obingwa result was yet to be presented when the directive from INEC headquarters in Abuja came for the exercise to the halted, and the action shifted to Abuja.