The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Lagos state recorded a convincing victory at the polling unit of its gubernatorial candidate, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode. Ambode cast his vote in his Epe hometown at the Unit 33, Ward A5 polling centre located in Ogunmodede Secondary school, Papa Epe.
The Epe electorates, inspired by the presence of the governorship candidate, gave the APC and its candidates a big win that saw the party poll an average 60% of the votes at the 3 levels contested.
In the Presidential elections, out of a total 170 accredited voters in the booth, the APC Presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari, amassed 97 votes as against the main opposition’s 71. The APC Senatorial candidate for Lagos East, Senator Gbenga Ashafa polled 103 votes to defeat the People’s Democratic Party’s 66 while Wale Raji, APC candidate for the Epe Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives secured 101 votes to cap off a sweeping victory.
At the adjourning polling unit 57 under the same ward A5, the APC took two-thirds of the votes to march conveniently to victory.
Similarly impressive results were recorded for the APC in the other wards and polling units in the division, a situation that sets the right tone in favour of the APC in the governorship and state House of Assembly elections coming up in two weeks.
The election process at the polling zone and in most parts of the Epe division was peaceful and witnessed an encouraging turnout of the Epe people who had turned out as early as 7:30am to exercise their franchise for progressiveness as the results have shown.
Mr. Ambode expressed delight at the encouraging turnout of the Epe electorates and the conduct of the elections at his polling unit. He stated his satisfaction with the performance of the card reader delight.
At exactly 2:44pm today, the governorship candidate, in company of his wife, Mrs. Bolanle Ambode, successfully cast his vote, after which he proceeded to engage with the press to state observations.
The process of accreditation had kicked off at the polling centre by 9:15 am, before voting commenced by 1:40pm. The seamless voting process lasted for more than two hours.
With reports of late arrival of INEC officials, polling materials, hitches experienced using the card reader and late commencement of accreditation in many polling units, Ambode urged the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to seriously consider an extension of the time of voting in order to resolve these issues to avoide the disenfranchisement of many voters.
Notably, INEC has now announced that it has extended the voting period till tomorrow, Sunday, to accommodate disenfranchised voters and areas where materials arrived late.