Tambuwal ‘Narrowly’ Re-Elected Sokoto Governor, Escapes Defeat By Ex-Deputy

Governor Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto State has emerged victorious after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) conducted a supplementary election on March 23 to determine the winner of the March 9 governorship election in the state.

The Resident Electoral Officer, Prof. Sadiq Musa, declared Tambuwal of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as winner of the election after he polled a total of 512,002 votes to defeat his closest rival Ahmed Aliyu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) who scored 511,661 votes.

Tambuwal narrowly won his former deputy Aliyu with 341 votes after losing 35 polling units in Kebbe, the last of the 22 LGAs where the rerun election held yesterday.

Aliyu was Tambuwal’s deputy during his first term until late 2018 when the former resigned and refused to join the Governor when he defected to the PDP in a bid to contest the presidential election under the Umbrella party.

INEC had declared the Sokoto governorship election inconclusive in the March 9 poll after Tambuwal scored 489,558 votes, while Aliyu of the APC got 486,145 votes.

The electoral umpire had said the margin of Tambuwal’s win in the first election was 3,413 votes, which it said was too small to determine the winner as there were a total number of 75,403 registered voters in 136 polling units where elections had been cancelled.