Voting has officially ended across the 16 local government areas of Ekiti State in Saturday’s off-cycle gubernatorial election, as sorting and counting of ballots at various polling units get underway.
The election, widely viewed as a major litmus test for political alliances ahead of the 2027 general elections, saw voters turn out to decide the next governor of the state.
Incumbent Governor Biodun Oyebanji of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is seeking a second term in office, facing competition from candidates of 10 other political parties.
The accreditation of voters and casting of ballots, which began around 8 am, ended at 2:30 pm at various polling units across the state.
This was followed by sorting of ballot papers and collation of results at polling units by officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Security personnel, election observers, and party agents are on the ground to monitor the transparency of the counting process.
Earlier, there were some reports of glitches in the accreditation and voting in some polling units. Some of the delays in accreditation and voting were reportedly caused by challenges encountered with the use of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machines.
Electoral officials in some of the polling units where it occurred attributed it to the inability of the BVAS machines to capture and validate the faces of voters, especially elderly ones, who they claimed may have undergone significant facial changes over the years, which the machines could not match with the records in the INEC database.
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The electoral body, which said that all 2,445 polling units across the state were successfully opened for the governorship election earlier in the day, assured that it would address the challenges and urged voters to exercise patience.
As counting concludes at the polling units, the results will be electronically transmitted via the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV) before manual collation begins at the ward, local government, and eventually State Collation Center in Ado-Ekiti.
According to electoral requirements, to emerge victorious, a candidate must secure a plurality of the valid votes cast and score over 25 per cent of the votes in at least two-thirds (11 out of 16) of the local government areas in the state.
