PHOTOS: Imo governorship result collation ends in a fight

The protracted collation of results of the Imo governorship election ended in fracas Monday morning. 

This is also as security operatives whisked away the agents of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Action Alliance (AA) for disrupting the collation exercise.

Trouble started at about 5:10am after the result of 12 council areas have been collated with the governorship candidate of the PDP in a comfortable lead.

The 13th council area, Ideato South, the home of Governor Rochas Okorocha, was about to be collated when the centre erupted in a free for all.

After calling out the Returning Officer for Ideato South and his Electoral Officer to present their result, Hon. Uche Onyeagucha, the agent of the PDP rose to in protest telling the panel collating the result that Governor Rochas Okorocha did not allow the election to be concluded as he had brutalized agents of other political parties and had thrown them.out of the collation centre while hijacking the process.

Onyeagucha said he would not allow the result to be presented because it was doctored by Governor Okorocha and the content reflects only the wish of the governor, as no agent was allowed inside the collation centre in Ideato South except Okorocha and his men.

He added that he had petitioned the Resident Electoral Commissioner,  Prof. Francis Ezeonu who he said had made calls and confirmed his claims to be true, that there was no justification for presenting the result which they all knew was fabricated.

But agents of the AA, Steve Asinobi and Paschal Onwukaike contended that the collation centre was not a place for taking petitions and complaints, and after a heated argument, the Returning Officer for the governorship poll,  Prof. Francis Otunta directed that the results be presented anyway.

At that instant,  Onyeagucha rose up, grabbed the result sheet from the Ideato South Returning Officer and crumpled it.

Paschal Onwukaike flew out of his seat and dashed at Onyeagucha and the hall erupted into a free-for-all fight forcing Onwukaike and Steve Asinobi to flee the hall for safety.

At that point, the security personnel in the premises rushed into the hall, apprehended Onyeagucha, Onwukaike and Asinobi. And after a thorough beating, they were bundled into a police truck and driven to the Police headquarters where they were detained.

With the votes collatee so far, the PDP governorship candidate, Ihedioha was leading his closest rival, Uche Nwosu of the AA with about 50,000 votes, with Senator Ifeanyi Araraume of APGA in third place ahead of Senator Hope Uzodinma of the APC.

As at the time of filing this report, INEC panel collating the result, having fled the chaos that erupted, was yet to say what becomes of the collation process or when stakeholders should reconvene for the rest of the results.