BREAKDOWN: N/East, S/East Top Regions Where INEC Cancelled 240 Polling Units

The North East and South East geopolitical zones have emerged as the regions with the highest number of polling units where elections would not be held in the forthcoming presidential and national assembly elections as well as the governorship and state assembly polls.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) released the list of 240 polling units that were cancelled in the February 25 and March 11 elections due to not having registered voters that would partake in the polls.

Professor Mahmood Yakubu announced the decision at a meeting he held with political parties on Monday in Abuja.

A regional breakdown of the full list of the exempted polling units published by INEC showed that 67 PUs were left out in the North East, 64 in the South East while 49 PUs were cancelled in the North Central region.

A state-by-state breakdown revealed that Imo and Taraba States had the highest number of cancelled polling units with 38 and 34, respectively.

The INEC boss had noted during the meeting that the affected polling units were avoided by voters mainly for security reasons, adding “This means that no elections will hold in these polling units.” The PUs are:

NORTH EAST (67)
Adamawa – 4
Bauchi – 6
Borno – 12
Taraba – 34
Yobe – 11

SOUTH EAST (64)
Abia – 12
Anambra – 6
Ebonyi – 4
Enugu – 4
Imo – 38

NORTH CENTRAL (49)
Benue 10
Kwara – 1
Nasarawa – 11
Niger – 10
Plateau – 6
FCT – 11

NORTH WEST (47)
Kaduna – 8
Kano – 10
Katsina – 12
Kebbi – 5
Sokoto – 8
Jigawa – 3
Zamfara – 1

SOUTH-SOUTH (8)
Bayelsa – 2
Delta – 4
Edo – 1
Rivers – 1

SOUTH WEST (5)

Ondo – 2
Lagos – 3

In December 2022, the electoral umpire revealed that it recorded 50 incidents of attacks on its offices from 2019 to 2022 across fifteen states of the country.

The states were Imo (11), Osun (7), Enugu (5), Akwa Ibom (5), Ebonyi (4), Cross River (4), and Abia (4), Anambra (2), Taraba (2), Kaduna (1), Borno (1), Bayelsa (1), Ondo (1), Lagos (1), and Ogun (1).