Lagos governor re-elected in victory for Nigeria’s ruling party | Election news

Babajide Sanwo-Olu of the Congress Progressive Party led the vote by a clear margin over his closest rival from the Workers’ Party.

Figures showed the Lagos governor handily won re-election in a low-turnout local ballot, marking a victory for Nigeria’s ruling party just weeks after the commercial capital backed the opposition in a disputed presidential election.

According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), incumbent Babajide Sanwo-Olu of the ruling Progressive Congress (APC) party secured more than 736,000 votes after ballots were counted in constituencies representing 95 percent of the electorate on Sunday.

His closest rival, Labor’s Gbadebo Rhodes-Favor, received 292,000 votes, according to figures from the Independent National Electoral Commission.

Turnout was just a small fraction of the seven million registered voters in Africa’s largest metropolis, which has a population of more than 20 million.

The Lagos election was the highlight of the races for powerful gubernatorial posts in 28 of Nigeria’s 36 states, as well as state assemblies across the country.

The race in Lagos had been expected to close after opposition Labor Party candidate Peter Obi garnered the most votes in the state during last month’s disputed presidential election, which was won by Paula Tinubu of the APC.

Tinubu himself is a former governor of Lagos, who ran the state from 1999 to 2007 and has since been seen as instrumental in selecting his successors there, including Sanwo-Olu.

Obi said widespread fraud robbed him of victory, and political analysts said his handling of last month’s presidential election could have discouraged some voters from participating in Saturday’s regional polls.

Some officials from the Independent National Electoral Commission who presented the results in Lagos on Sunday reported that some ballot boxes were stolen, but said this was not widespread enough to affect the outcome of the vote.

Voting has been postponed to Sunday at 10 polling stations in a Lagos neighborhood after disputes between Independent National Electoral Commission officials and voters over the locations of polling stations. The final results were expected at a later date.

Rulers wield wide influence in Africa’s most populous nation, and their support can help determine who becomes president.

Some rulers preside over states whose annual budgets are larger than those of some small African states. Lagos has an annual budget of $4 billion.

In northeastern Adamawa, a conservative and Muslim-majority state, election officials were compiling results after a race that could see Nigeria’s first woman elected governor.

Voters were still casting ballots in two areas in the oil-producing Rivers state, where the Independent Electoral Commission failed to provide voting materials.

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