By Nelson Ogbu
The incumbent Chairman of the Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), Christopher Maikalangu of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has been declared winner of the council’s chairmanship election conducted in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
The declaration was made by the AMAC Collation Officer, Andrew Abue, who announced that Maikalangu secured 40,295 votes to emerge victorious in the contest.
According to the official results, the African Democratic Congress (ADC) candidate, Paul Moses came second with 12,109 votes, while the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Dantani Zanda, polled 3,398 votes.
Abue stated that a total of 62,861 votes were valid, with 2,336 rejected ballots, bringing the total votes cast to 65,197. He added that out of 837,338 registered voters, 65,676 were accredited for the election.
A breakdown of results from other political parties shows relatively low voter tallies across the board. These include Accord (403), Action Alliance (108), Action Democratic Party (588), APGA (1,111), APM (122), APP (32), Boot Party (43), NNPP (1,694), NRM (73), PRP (90), SDP (2,185), YPP (421), and ZLP (189).
Reacting to the outcome, APC collation agent, Gambo Babale, commended the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for what he described as a credible and transparent electoral process. He noted that the conduct of the election across polling units and collation centres reflected a high level of integrity.
Similarly, Abdullahi Ibrahim, the ward collation agent of the Young Progressives Party (YPP), described the exercise as transparent and extended congratulations to the declared winner.
