The All Progressives Congress (APC) has swept the Federal and state Constituencies seats in the Saturday bye-election held in Cross River and Imo States.
The Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) declared Jude Ngaji and Mr Blyden Okanni, both of the All Progressives Congress as winners in Yala/ Ogoja Federal Constituency bye election and Ngor Okpala state constituency by-election in Imo State, respectively.
Declaring Ngaji winner, the returning officer for the bye-election , Dr. Edor John Edor stated that the APC candidate polled 22, 778 to defeat Hon Mike Usibe of the People’s Democratic Party(PDP)who garnered 20, 590.Dr Edor, the INEC Returning Officer for the election, announced the result on Sunday in Ogoja.
Similarly, the INEC Returning Officer for the Ngor Okpala State Constituency by-election, Prof. Dennis Akoh,said that Okanni polled 9,248 votes to defeat his closest rival, Mr Emeka Nwachukwu of the Peoples Democratic Party who scored 7,161 votes.Akoh, a professor at the Federal University, Ndufu-Alike Ikwor (FUNAI) in Ebonyi, said the candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Mr Christopher Nwaiwu placed third with 501 votes.
He said out of the 11 candidates that contested the by-election, the only female and candidate of the National Rescue Movement (NRM), Mrs Joy Nze, got 15 votes.
The returning officer said a total of 18,083 voters were accredited for the poll, out of a total of the 94,118 registered voters in the area.He said the total valid votes cast were 17,280, while 582 votes were rejected.No fewer than eleven registered political parties participated in the election.
The parties included the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), All Progressives Congress (APC), All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), the African Democratic Congress (ADC) and Labour Party (LP).
Others were the Young Progressives Party (YPP), Zenith Labour Party (ZLP), National Rescue Movement (NRM), New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), Allied People’s Movement (APM), Action Democratic Party (ADP) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP).
