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Ahead of the Osun state governorship rerun elections scheduled for September 27, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has called on the candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Senator Iyiola Omisore, to join forces with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Senator Ademola Adeleke, to defeat the All Progressives Congress (APC).
The Returning officer of the September 22 election, Joseph Afuwape, had declared the election inconclusive after the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Adeleke polled 254,698 to beat his closest rival in the APC, Adegboyega Oyetola, who polled 254, 345 votes by 353 votes.
Afuwape said he could not declare a winner since the difference between the two leading parties was just 353 votes, which was lower than the number of registered voters in areas where polls were cancelled due to one irregularity or the other. The number of cancelled votes was 3,498.
SEE: UPDATED official INEC RESULTS from 30 Local Government Areas
The rerun election will include the 45 parties that participated in the election on Saturday.
The SDP came a distant third but it had a good showing in two of the affected local governments – Ife North and Ife South. With that in mind, the APC and the PDP may have started courting Omisore to swing his supporters to their side. The other affected areas are in Orolu local government and Osogbo local government.
In a tweet on Monday, Atiku urged Omisore to support Adeleke since he was once a PDP member and also not satisfied with the state of things in Osun under the current APC administration.
Expressing confidence that the PDP will win the rerun, Atiku said: “I call on Senator Omisore to remember the PDP which believed in him and gave him its ticket in 2014”
His full tweet reads: “I am confident PDP will win in Osun, no matter the ulterior motive of APC. I call on Senator Omisore to remember the PDP, which believed in him and gave him its ticket in 2014. I urge him to join with all who want to deliver Osun from negative change and support @IsiakaAdeleke1”