General apathy characterised the supplementary governorship election conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission in 212 electoral wards of Anambra State yesterday. The supplementary election was organised by the INEC to complement the inconclusive elections of November 16, which had been criticised as greatly flawed by both international and local observers, including the All Progressives Congress, Labour Party, and Peoples Democratic Party candidates in the election. The three candidates boycotted the poll

Meanwhile, the APGA candidate Willie Obiano has emerged the governor-elect.
In the final results – November 16 plus yesterday’s supplementary poll, Obiano polled a total of 180, 178 votes to PDP’s Tony Nwoye who came second with 97,200 votes. APC’s Senator Chris Ngige came third with 95,963 votes and LP’s Ifeanyi Ubah who polled 37, 495 votes.

In the results of the November 16 election, Obiano had polled 174,710 while PDP, APC and LP trailed with 94,956, 92,300, and 37,446 in that order. Twenty three parties participated in the election.

In yesterday’s supplementary election, Obiano polled 5,468 to increase his tally, while Ngige polled 3,663. Nwoye polled 2,744.

Although, there was heavy presence of security personnel from the military, police and civil defence across the state, especially in the affected areas, voter turnout was generally low.

At Anyaeji ward 9, Onitsha North state constituency, for instance, 54 out of 484 registered voters were accredited to vote as at 12.30pm when voting started. The situation was worse at ward 6, Fegge, Onitsha South, comprising 17 polling units with a voting strength of over 12,000, where only about 20 voters was accredited at the Plaza Square in the area with four polling units as at 11.30am.

At the Nkpor Junction polling unit, in Idemili North council area, Josiah Blessing, a National Youth Service Corps member who worked as a presiding officer said 26 voters were accredited to vote out of the 372 registered at the unit.

The APC governorship candidate, Ngige, thanked the people of Anambra State residing in the 16 local government areas where the supplementary election took place, especially, Idemili North Local Government Area, for boycotting the election.
A text message from him read, “Thanks to Anambra people in the 16 local governments, especially Idemili North, for boycotting. No faith in INEC.”
Dr. Emeka Anaebonam, APC member for Onitsha South I constituency in the Anambra State House of Assembly, told THISDAY that his party was not participating in the supplementary election; hence he decided to sit back in his office. He said that the apathy towards the supplementary election being conducted in his ward 6, Fegge, Onitsha, was expected because people were disenchanted with the way the November 16 governorship election was bungled.

Anaebonam described the supplementary election as that of APGA in which no one was checked what they were doing.

“The so-called supplementary election is being conducted in my own ward 6, Fegge, Onitsha South. I belong to APC and my party is not participating in the election. As you can see, I am sitting down here in my office,” he said. “As expected, the turn-out generally is low. We have three polling units behind my office with a total voting strength of 2,305, but today I hear up to 300 were accredited.”

According to him, “During my election into the state Assembly I had about 1,200 who voted for me in the three units combined. And now in a governorship election, you are expecting just 300 people to vote. It is serious apathy.
“It is free for APGA.”

Anaebonam alleged that even as the APC had made its position not to participate clear before the supplementary election, he was told that some people claiming to be APC agents were arranged to stand in the polling units as representatives of the party. But he said they gave themselves away because they had no APC tags on them, indicating that they did not come from the party. He said the “fake agents” were brought in to try to give the election credibility.

But his APGA counterpart, who represents Onitsha North state constituency, Hon. Chugbo Enwezor, said the apathy came about because of lack of awareness for the election by the INEC.

“That’s why there is need for continuous enlightenment. Some people came in the morning, accredited and went back to the market, hoping to come back later to vote.
“INEC is part of the problem because they have not been embarking on this enlightenment programme,” he said.

The APGA lawmaker said his party had won the election clean and square even from the results released after the November 16 election.
Enwezor disagreed that APC, particularly, boycotted the election, saying they only sold a dummy to the people while working behind the scenes.

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