Yiaga Africa, a civil society organization, has said that results from Saturday’s council elections in Lagos State were either partially announced or not announced in some Local Government Areas.
The group revealed that in several LGAs, the official figures of registered voters and the number of accredited voters was not announced nor indicated in the results forms.
Council elections in Lagos State took place across the 20 local government areas and 37 local council development areas of the state the exercise was marred by low turnout Of eligible voters amid complains by the opposition parties of wide spread irregularities by officials.
In press conferences Sunday to inform the media on its observations, Eze Nwagwu a board member of the organization said collation did not take place in several polling units in some LGAs.
The local government areas listed includes; Badagry, Eti-Osa, Ikorodu, Kosofe, Ajeromi/Ifelodun, Surulere, Shomolu and Lagos Island.
“LGA results collation centres revealed that the official results were either partially announced or not announced. LASIEC officials in the Lagos Island collation centre did not conduct the results collation,” he said.
He added that similar situation happened in Ajeromi/Ifelodun where only submission of results happened at the collation centre and results from the polling units were collated officials left without addressing people.
He said in Badagry, Kosofe, the official figures of registered voters and a total number of accredited voters was not announced nor indicated in the results form.
Also, In his preliminary report on the election, Cynthia Mbamalu , director of programmes of the organization, lamented that the poor turnout of voters in the election, noting that the citizenry showed lack of interest in the election.
Mbamalu said voters apathy in the election was an indication to the capacity deficit on human, financial resources and technical expertise required for successful election administration at the local level.
According to him,”Also, the process was not concluded in Shomolu, as officials left without announcing the results. In Surulere LGA, the official result for the LGA was not announced”.
“In Ikorodu, electoral officials only declared the total number of votes cast and no information was provided on the votes share per party”.
