Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Mahmood Yakubu has declared the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu as winner of the 2023 presidential election.
The INEC chair made the declaration on Wednesday at the National Collation Centre, Abuja.
Tinubu defeated 17 other candidates who took part in the election. He scored a total of 8,794,726 votes, the highest of all the candidates, thus meeting the first constitutional requirement to be declared the winner.
He also scored over 25 per cent of the votes cast in 30 states, more than the 25 states constitutionally required.
INEC Chairman Mahmood Yakubu, who announced the final results in the early hours of Wednesday in Abuja, said Atiku Abubakar of the PDP came second in the election.
Atiku polled a total of 6,984,520 votes in the election.
Peter Obi of the Labour Party came third in the election with a total of 6,101,533 votes while Rabiu Kwankwaso of the NNPP came fourth with 1,496,687 votes.
Only the top four candidates won the presidential election in at least one state. Each of Messrs Tinubu, Atiku and Obi won in 12 states while Mr Kwankwaso won only in Kano.
However, winning a majority of states is not a requirement for a candidate to be declared the winner of the election.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has raised the alarm that danger is lurking around the country over the alleged compromise of the ongoing election process.
Obasanjo appealed to the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd), to prevail on the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Mahmood Yakubu, to stop the process and rectify the allegations raised against it from many quarters.
Obasanjo in a personally signed letter titled, “An appeal for caution and rectification,” released on Monday, said some politicians had compromised some electoral officials to make the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System machines not to work.
He said, “I am constrained to speak at this point. I crave the indulgence of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, His Excellency General Muhammadu Buhari, to make this statement because I have had opportunity to keep him aware of what I know is happening and the danger looming ahead.
“On many occasions in the past, I have not hesitated to point out lacuna in the action of the President and his government. But as far as the election issues are concerned, the President has proved beyond reasonable doubt that he will want to leave a legacy of free, fair, transparent and credible elections.
“Until last Saturday night, February 25, 2023, the good and noble plan and preparation for the elections seemed to be going well. For the Independent National Electoral Commission, a lot of money was spent to introduce Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS), and the server for immediate transmission of results from polling units. It is no secret that INEC officials, at operational levels, have been allegedly compromised to make what should have worked not to work and to revert to manual transmission of results which is manipulated and the results doctored.
“The Chairman of INEC may claim ignorance but he cannot fold his hands and do nothing when he knows that election process has been corrupted and most of the results that are brought outside BVAS and server are not a true reflection of the will of Nigerians who have made their individual choice. At this stage, we do not need wittingly or unwittingly to set this country on fire with the greed, irresponsibility and unpatriotic act of those who allegedly gave money to INEC officials for perversion and those who collected the blood money.
“Let me appeal to the Chairman of INEC, if his hands are clean, to save Nigeria from the looming danger and disaster which is just waiting to happen. If the Chairman can postpone elections four days to the election, he can do everything to rectify the errors of the last two days – no BVAS, no result to be acceptable; and no uploading through Server, no result to be acceptable.
“Whereas, BVAS and Servers have been manipulated or rendered inactive, such results must be declared void and inadmissible for election declaration. Chairman INEC, I have thought that you would use this wonderful opportunity to mend your reputation and character for posterity.
“Your Excellency, President Buhari Muhammadu, tension is building up and please let all elections that do not pass the credibility and transparency test be cancelled and be brought back with areas where elections were disrupted for next Saturday, March 4, 2023, and BVAS and Server officials be changed. To know which stations or polling units were manipulated, let a committee of INEC staff and representatives of the four major political parties with the Chairman of Nigerian Bar Association look into what must be done to have hitch-free elections next Saturday.
“Mr. President, may your plan and hope for leaving a legacy of free, fair, transparent and credible election be realised. Mr. President, please don’t let anybody say to you that it does not matter or it is the problem of INEC. On no account should you be seen as part of the collusion or compromise. When the die is cast, it will be your problem as the Chief Executive of the nation. The Chairman of INEC may sneak out of the country or go back to his Ivory Tower. Your Excellency, thank you for hearing me out.
“Compatriot Nigerians, please exercise patience until the wrong is righted. I strongly believe that nobody will toy with the future and fortune of Nigeria at this juncture.”
ASUU President, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) in Abuja.
NAN recalls that ASUU had been on strike for the past five months to press home its demands.
According to Osodeke, we will punish those who have pulled out from our ongoing strike the appropriate way.
“We will ensure to query them and we will follow it up the appropriate way. We have even queried some of them in accordance with the union,’’ he said.
Osodeke also noted that since the last Tripartite Plus meeting called by the Chief of Staff to the President on the ongoing industrial action over a month ago, there has been no other meeting.
He said that there was nothing concrete that came out of the last meeting that was held at the villa.
“We have not been called for any other meeting since that time and government did not offer us anything, they just ask us to meeting with the committee that was all.
He also said that the union will be meeting with government within the week.
The management of the Polytechnic Ibadan, Oyo State has urged students of the Institution to vacate their halls of residence.
The Institution gave the students until 4pm on Tuesday, the 14th of June to leave the school hostels.
The school authorities said its decision to ask the students to vacate followed the formal conclusion of the 2020/2021 academic session and the commencement of vacation.
Registrar, Polytechnic Ibadan, Mrs Modupe Theresa Fawale, in a statement made available to newsmen, directed all students to immediately proceed on an end-of-session vacation.
The Registrar also informed parents and guardians and other members of the public that the Institution is on vacation.
“All students of The Polytechnic Ibadan (TPI) are to proceed on the immediate end of session vacation as the institution formally concludes the 2020/2021 academic session.
“Any student found violating this directive will be sanctioned accordingly”.
“Parents and guardians and members of the public, particularly communities in the neighbourhood of The Polytechnic, Ibadan (TPI) such as Apete, Awotan, Idi-Ito, Agbaje, Sango, Arola, Ariyiibi and others are to note that Students of The Polytechnic, Ibadan (TPI) are on vacation”.
Following clamour for extension of the deadline due to upsurge in the number of potential registrants and the attendant logistics hitches, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, last week, said extension might be considered.
Some online reports claimed the deadline had been extended prompting celebration in some quarters.
Asked if was true the deadline has been extended to August 31, 2022, Mr Rotimi Oyekanmi, chief press secretary to the INEC Chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, said: “No. It is not true. The deadline for the Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) is still 30th June. The online pre-registration service closed since 30th May.
“What the Commission has done to respond to the surge in numbers of those who want to register, is to deploy more INEC Voter Enrollment Devices (IVEDs) to areas where the pressure is highest.
“These areas are all the states in the South-East region, Kano, Lagos and the FCT.”
There were strong indications that the All Progressives Congress national officials were divided over a plan by the President, Major General Muhammadu (retd.), to pick his preferred presidential candidate for the party.
Feelers from a meeting of the APC governors’ meeting on Tuesday night indicated that the governors could not agree on a consensus and the fact that the President should pick the party’s presidential candidate.
It was also learnt that the committee, which screened the party’s presidential aspirants, would submit its report to the National Chairman, Abdullahi Adamu, on Thursday (today).
Buhari, in an interview with Channels Television in January, said he had a favourite candidate, whom he said he would keep to himself.
“I wish to solicit the reciprocity and support of the governors and other stakeholders in picking my successor, who would fly the flag of our party for election into the office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2023,” the President urged the governors.
Meanwhile, the APC National Vice Chairman (North-West), Mallam Salihu Lukman, in an open letter to Buhari, warned that picking a successor would be costly and risky for the President and the party.
He stated, “The temptation for leaders to choose their successors is democratically risky and very costly. If in 2013/2014, Your Excellency could submit yourself to the internal democratic process, it is important that your successor also follows the same process.
“Notwithstanding, however, there is the overriding requirement to appeal to you to kindly resist the temptation. I would have wished we had enough time for open debate within our party. Unfortunately, as things are, we have less than one week to settle this matter.
The council made this known in a statement made available to newsmen.
“The 2022 NECO Senior School Certificate Examination will commence on June 27, 2022 and end on Friday August 12. “Candidates are to be examined in 76 subjects during the examination,” the examination body noted.
He said, “We extended the registration deadline so that schools that have not registered will register their students. We do not plan to extend again.
“State Ministries of Education, Principals, Commandants and all stakeholders are enjoined to note that there would be no further extension after that.
As of this morning, a tight security presence was sighted at the main gate of UNILAG. Pictures also showed that some students had gathered at the main gate of UI, under the aegis of “Fund Education Coalition”, with their banner bearing captions like “we say no to commercialisation of education”, “every one of us must rise to defend education”, “we stand with ASUU revitalisation demand”.
The strike action of the lecturers which is entering its fourth month has left public universities shut since its inception following the lecture’s demands, which the Federal Government had, allegedly, not met.
One of the students at the UI convergence point for the protest, who made comments to our correspondent, Solomon Emiola, said, “we are converging now”.
Meanwhile, Students and youths has gathered in their number to protest in Ibadan against persistent school closure following the strike action of the Academic Staff Union of Universities.
The students gathered in front of the University of Ibadan with various inscriptions on their placards calling for an end to the ASUU strike.
In this interview, the Minister of Labour and Employment and Conciliator-in-Chief of the Federal Government, Senator Chris Ngige disclosed the outcome of a meeting with the Nigeria Inter-Religious Council over the ongoing strike embarked upon by the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities, Non-Academic Staff Union of Allied and Educational Institutions, NASU and National Association of Academic Technologists, NAAT.
How did the meeting go?
I explained to them what had happened, where we are and that a lot of committees have been set up, working with education for them to get these things sorted out. And they have timelines, six weeks. So, ASUU has no business going on strike within that six weeks, they don’t have to. And by labour laws, once I am conciliating a matter, you don’t go on strike, you don’t continue with your strike. I have apprehended it, you know, so if they go on strike like that, they are forcing me to look at other areas of labour laws, because I cannot sit down as minister and a strike is going on and I am doing nothing. If I am unable to apprehend it, then I should send it to higher bodies, National Industrial Court of Nigeria.
Do you think that their demands or agitations are wrong?
What kind of question is that? Somebody says you should review his salary, how can it be a wrong demand? It is not a wrong demand by any standard anywhere in the world, it is not. But you discuss with your employers, that is how it is; and then he will give you his books and every other thing. You look into the ability to pay. It is a part of Decent Work Agenda and International Labour Organisation, ILO Principles at Work.
Can my employer afford this? That is it. So I am not against them demanding that and that is why I told the Ministry of Education to bring back the Committee to look at the proposal that the Professor Manzali Committee did because a lot of the members of the Committee have left. So bring them back and look at this report and then you distill it and get something up for the higher body of government which is the Presidential Committee on Salaries for now.
But as it stands now, what is the way forward, what is the government doing to address the issue?
We are dialoguing, the committees are working, UTAS is being tested.
Which group are you dialoguing with? Is it with ASUU, SSANU, NASU or NAAT?
That of SSANU and NASU is new. So I have asked their employers to go and look at it. Like you are talking about the Staff Schools, that issue is an issue that has long been on ground and we agreed on the ways and things to be implemented. So I don’t know.
What about a court judgment on the issue which the government has not implemented?
Are you sure government didn’t appeal the judgment? I think there is an appeal. But there is an area of the judgment that government said it will implement and the Education ministry said they will implement and I am sure they have implemented that.
If government has implemented it, don’t you think it will be unreasonable for anyone to go on strike because of that?
That is what you should ask them. It is becoming a habit that when ASUU goes on strike, NASU and SSANU feel that the university is now empty, that they should also go on strike. So that is what has been going on.
When are we expecting the strikes to come to an end?
You should ask them.
On the side of government, you are the chief conciliator, what efforts are being made to ensure that the strikes are called off?
I am the chief conciliator, yes, but they have their primary employer which is the Ministry of Education, so the Ministry of Education will answer this question, they are their workers, they are their staff.
Have you as the conciliator told their employer, the Ministry of Education the adverse effect of these prolonged strikes?
The adverse effect of the strike is not good, it is like going to war, war does no side any good. But the people who bear the brunt are the children and their parents. So I don’t like it.
Have you told their employers what they should do as the chief conciliator?
I have discussed with them, and they have shown me what they are doing and I think with what they are doing, they are going in the right direction.
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