Senator Gemade: upsets Suswam

The Senate Minority Leader, George Akume, has defeated Mike Mku of the PDP to retain his seat in the Senate of the National Assembly.

Announcing the results on Monday in Makurdi, the Returning Officer for Benue West Senatorial Constituency, Prof. Oku Oto, said Akume polled 168,806 to beat Mku who had 110,180 votes.

He added that Attah Ikpa of APGA scored 568 votes in the election.

Oto said the number of registered voters in the constituency were 1,668,320, while accredited voters were 298,584.

“The rejected votes were 3,332, while valid votes were 279,644,’’ he said.

Buhari and Senator Akume in Maiduguri

Meanwhile, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Benue, Prof. Istifinus Dafwang, has ordered a repeat of elections in three wards in the Buruku Federal Constituency on the grounds of malpractices.

For the Benue East Senatorial district, Governor Gabriel Suswam lost to Barnabas Gemade, of the APC. Gemade, the incumbent, was denied the ticket by Suswam, after which he crossed from the PDP to APC.

However, Suswam has not accepted the result with equanimity.

He has vowed to challenge the results in court on grounds of electoral malpractices.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Gemade, a former chairman of the PDP, defeated Suswam in the recently conducted National Assembly elections by a margin of over 22,000 votes to retain his seat in the National Assembly.

Gemade polled a total of 140, 715 votes while Suswam had 118,603 votes.

Addressing newsmen on Tuesday in Makurdi, Suswam’s agent in the election, Solomon Wombo, accused the INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Prof Istifinus Dafwang, of partisanship.

Wombo, who is also the Special Adviser to the governor on Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, said the REC displayed obvious partisanship when he excluded the PDP in most decisions during the election.

Governor Suswam: floored by Gemade

He accused the REC of allowing the APC to convey result sheets to Makurdi without agents of the PDP, thereby allowing them the opportunity to manipulate figures.

” When the the REC took the decision to change the collation centre for the constituency from Katsina-Ala to Makurdi, he never told the PDP but relayed the decision to the APC.

“When we complained that results in four council wards in Konshisha local government reflected more names than those actually accredited to vote, he did nothing, even when he took a decision on a similar matter in Logo local government area.

He said voters in nine council wards in Vandeikya local government council were disenfranchised for no obvious reason, yet the REC condoned the injustice.

Wombo also alleged that strongholds of the PDP were disenfranchised in the election while result sheets were mutilated and doctored to suit the whims of the APC.

“The behavior of the commissioner is questionable and suspicious; I had to ask him if he was an agent of the APC and whether he had personal issues with the governor,” Suswam said.