Governor Adeleke Holds Slim Lead As Osun Governorship Results Collation Continues

Governor Ademola Adeleke of the Accord Party is maintaining a slim lead in the ongoing collation of results from Saturday’s Osun State governorship election as the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) continues to upload results to its Result Viewing Portal.

As of 7:20 p.m., 2,862 of the 3,763 expected polling-unit results, representing 76.06 per cent, had been uploaded to the INEC portal.

Results available on the Nigeria Elections Intelligence System showed that figures from 303 of the state’s 332 wards had been collated, with Adeleke polling 177,572 votes, representing 50.5 percent of the votes recorded so far.

His closest challenger, Bola Oyebamiji of the All Progressives Congress, had secured 158,588 votes, representing 45.1 percent.

Najeem Salaam of the African Democratic Congress was a distant third with 5,917 votes as of the time of filing this report.

Collation was still ongoing across the state’s 30 local government areas.

The figures showed that 361,500 voters were accredited out of 845,100 registered voters in the affected wards, representing a voter turnout of 42.8 percent.

A total of 351,500 valid votes had so far been recorded, while 7,200 ballots were rejected.

At his polling unit in Ede North Local Government Area, Adeleke recorded a decisive victory.

Results announced by the Presiding Officer, Adebimpe Susan Dunsin, at Unit 009, Abogunde/Sagba, showed Adeleke polling 421 votes, while Oyebamiji scored 29 votes and Salaam secured one vote.

Only 457 of the 1,082 registered voters at the polling unit turned out to vote before the exercise ended at 4:15 p.m.

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Adeleke, who is seeking a second term in office, defected from the Peoples Democratic Party to the Accord Party ahead of the election.

INEC had cleared 14 political parties to contest the election after the PDP and Labour Party failed to field candidates.

Adeleke is contesting with Kola Adenusi as his running mate, while Oyebamiji, a former managing director of the National Inland Waterways Authority, is contesting alongside Benjamin Adereti.

The final outcome of the election will be determined after the completion of collation from all outstanding wards.

INEC’s returning officer is expected to formally declare the winner at the state collation centre once the outstanding results have been received and verified.