INEC declares General Buhari winner of Nigeria’s Presidential Election
By CHINYERE Ogbonna -The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), General Muhammadu Buhari, winner of Nigeria’s presidential election.
He defeated the incumbent, President Dr. Goodluck Jonathan.
The announcement was made by the Chairman of INEC, Professor Attahiru Jega, after the completion of the collation and announcement of results from across the country by all returning officers who served in various states of the federation at the collation centre in Abuja.
The exercise started at the nation’s capital, on Monday and ended on Tuesday, March 31.
Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari
After the announcement of votes received by all fourteen candidates, the INEC Chairman received the results from the thirty-six states plus the FCT and proceeded with computation and tallying, a process which ran into the early hours of this morning.
General Muhammadu Buhari of the APC polled a total of fifteen thousand four hundred four hundred and twenty,four thousand nine hundred and twenty-one (15,424,921) votes to defeat all other candidates, with Dr Goodluck Jonathan of the PDP polling a total of twelve thousand eight hundred and fifty-three thousand one hundred and sixty-two (12,853,162) votes to clinch the second position.
Professor Jega went on to declare the APC presidential candidate as the winner of the presidential election and was returned elected “having satisfied the requirements of the law and scoring the highest numbers of votes”.
Muhammadu Buhari, born December 17, 1942, is a retired Major-General of the Nigerian Army.
He was Head of State of Nigeria from December 31, 1983 to August 27, 1985, after taking power in a military coup d’état.
He had contested unsuccessfully for the office of President in the 2003, 2007 and 2011 elections.
In December 2014, he emerged as the Presidential Candidate of the APC, for the 2015 elections.
A native of Daura in Katsina State, north west Nigeria, General. Buhari is of the Fulani ethnic background and a Muslim of the Sunni Islam.
