INEC dashes Akpabio’s hope of returning to Senate

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has insisted that its report on the Akwa Ibom North-West (Ikot Ekpene) senatorial ticket is final and cannot be reopened.

It would be recalled that the immediate past Minister of Niger Delta Affairs and former governor of the state, Godswill Akpabio, had emerged the winner of a re-run primary conducted at the Skill Acquisition Centre, Ikot Ekpene, having polled 478 votes out of 512 accredited delegates for the election.

However, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Akwa Ibom State, Barrister, Mike Igini, said the re-run primary that led to the emergence of Senator Godswill Akpabio as the All Progressives Congress candidate (APC) for the district is strange and unknown to law.

According to him, the May 27, 2022 primary, which produced a former Deputy Inspector-General of Police, Udum Ekpoudum (retd.), subsists because it was not cancelled, neither was it rendered inconclusive. He added that Senator Akpabio’s emergence is nothing but a “Nollywood fantasy.

Igini added that what he knew about Akpabio was that he was the presidential aspirant for the All Progressives Congress who stepped down for Bola Tinubu, adding that, even if there was a re-run, it could only be conducted for aspirants that participated in the first primary.

He advised politicians contesting the 2023 general election to meticulously study the new provisions of the 2022 Electoral Act as amended, so as not to continue with the hope that things were still the way it were with the repealed 2010 and 2012 Electoral Act.