By Ogochukwu Isioma
The Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2023 general elections, Atiku Abubakar, has congratulated Ahmadu Fintiri, governorship candidate of the party, on his re-election victory as Governor of Adamawa State.
INEC on Tuesday declared Fintiri as the winner of Saturday’s supplementary election in Adamawa. He polled 430,861 votes to defeat Aisha ‘Binani’ Dahiru, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), who came second with a total of 398,788 votes.
In a post on social media on Tuesday to congratulate Fintiri, Atiku declared that there was one more major mandate to reclaim, apparently referring to the outcome of the February 25, 2023 presidential election which the former Vice-President is challenging in court.
METROWATCHXTRA.COM recalls that the Independent National Electoral Commission had declared Bola Ahmed Tinubu, candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), as the winner of the disputed 2023 presidential poll. Atiku came second in the exercise.
Taking to Facebook and Twitter to congratulate Fintiri on his re-election victory as the Adamawa State governor, Atiku thanked the people of Adamawa and men and women of goodwill ”for staying the course in resisting coupists and enemies of democracy from having their way.”
According to him, “The lesson from this exercise and others is the need for Nigerians to be vigilant and never give in to anti-democratic forces whose objective is to snatch, run with and undermine the mandate of the people as freely expressed in their votes.
”By the way, it is not yet uhuru as we still have one more major mandate to reclaim, and together as ONE, we shall accomplish the task for the good of our country and its people,” the Adamawa-born politician added.
Earlier, INEC announced suspension of collation of results from the supplementary poll after the commission’s Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Hudu Yunusa Ari, controversially declared APC’s Binani governor-elect, while the process was still on.
The electoral umpire subsequently voided the declaration by the embattled REC, noting that the action was an “usurpation of the powers” of the Returning Officer. INEC further directed Ari to stay away from all activities relating to the election and from its Adamawa office.
However, INEC reconvened on Tuesday to conclude the collation of results from the supplementary poll and declared Governor Fintiri as the winner in the absence of the embattled REC.
