The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in March 18 governorship poll in Jigawa State, Umar Namadi as the winner of the election.

The deputy governor and former commissioner of finance in the North-West state scored 618,449 votes to defeat his closest rivals — Mustafa Lamido of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who polled 368,726 and Aminu Ringim of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) who got 37,156 votes.

Namadi will replace the incumbent, Abubakar Badaru of the APC whose two-term of eight years ends on May 29, 2023.

Governorship elections were held in 28 of Nigeria’s 36 states on Saturday. The governorship and state assembly elections were held a week later than initially scheduled after a court case forced INEC to move them forward.

Eight of the 36 states — Anambra, Bayelsa, Edo, Ekiti, Imo, Kogi, Osun, and Ondo — have governorship elections “off-season” due to litigations and court judgements.

In alphabetical order, the 28 states where governorship elections were on March 18 are Abia, Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Bauchi, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Enugu, Gombe, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kebbi, Kwara, Lagos, Nasarawa, Niger, Ogun, Oyo, Plateau, Rivers, Sokoto, Taraba, Yobe, Zamfara.

Of the 28 states, 11 serving governors sought reelection while 17 outgoing governors are in the final weeks of their constitutional two-term limits of eight years, having been sworn in on May 29, 2015. (Channels TV)

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