Aishatu ‘Binani’ Dahiru of the All Progressives Congress is bidding to become the first elected female Governor in the history of Nigeria as supplementary governorship elections take centre stage in her Adamawa and Kebbi State today.
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, had declared the March 18 governorship polls in both states inconclusive but the polls are expected to be concluded today.
Dahiru who is popularly known as Binani has a mountain to climb as she was trailing the incumbent Governor Umaru Fintiri with over 35,000 votes. The Peoples Democratic Party’s flag bearer is leading by 401,113 votes while Binani has 365,498 votes.
The incumbent has won in 12 local governments while Binani led in eight of the 20 LGAs announced so far.
The two contestants are fighting for 94,209 votes in 142 polling units across the state.
In Kebbi, INEC cancelled 91,829 votes which is more than the gap of lead between the top candidates hence the announcement of inconclusiveness of the polls. The candidate of All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr. Nasir Idris, scored 388,258, while Mohammed Bande of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) recorded 342,980 with the margin between the two standing at just 45,278 votes.
Therefore supplementary polls will take place in 69 polling units across 20 of the 21 local government areas of the state today.
Apart from the two governorship polls there will be other elections including senatorial polls expected to take place in Sokoto, Kebbi and Zamfara states
In Sokoto, supplementary elections are to hold for all three senatorial seats -Sokoto North, Sokoto East and Sokoto South- where elections were earlier declared inconclusive. Elections will be held in 389 polling units across all the 23 LGAs of the state. Altogether, there are 227,743 eligible voters to participate in the election.
In Kebbi and Zamfara, the election is to hold in one senatorial district each -Kebbi North and Zamfara Central. While the election will be holding in 23 PUs in the Kebbi North senatorial elections, voters in 83 PUs will be voting for the Zamfara Central senatorial election. They have 13,243 and 47,277 eligible voters, respectively.
Meanwhile, supplementary elections for the House of Representatives will be held for 31 constituencies in 15 states. They are; Akwa Ibom (2), Anambra (1), Bayelsa (1), Edo (1), Imo (1), Kano (2), Kebbi (2), Kogi (1), Oyo (2), Rivers (2), Sokoto (11), Taraba (1) , Zamfara (2), Jigawa (1) and Ebonyi state (1).
For the states House of Assembly positions, elections will be held for 57 constituencies in 17 states. They are: Akwa Ibom (1), Bayelsa (1), Ebonyi (5), Edo (3), Ekiti (1), Imo (1), Kaduna (5), Kano (14), Kebbi (8), Niger (4), Ogun (1), Taraba (1), Yobe (1), Jigawa (3), Katsina (3), Enugu (1), Adamawa (4).
