Governor Charles Chukwuma Soludo of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) has been declared winner of the November 8 gubernatorial election in Anambra State.

Soludo, who won in 19 out of the 21 Local Government Areas, polled a total of 422,664 votes to defeat his closest rivals, Nicholas Ukachukwu of the All Progressives Congress (APC), who scored 99,445 votes, and Paul Chukwuma of the Young Progressives Party (YPP), who garnered 37,753 votes.

Other contenders included Kingsley Moghalu of the Labour Party (LP), who scored 10,576 votes, and Nwosu of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), who got 8,208 votes.

The State Collation Officer for the election, Professor Edoba B. Omoregie, SAN, Vice Chancellor of the University of Benin, announced the results on behalf of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Awka.

According to him, Anambra State had 2,788,864 registered voters, with 598,229 accredited voters participating in the election. He put the total valid votes at 584,054, rejected votes at 11,244, and total votes cast at 595,298.

Omoregie added that about 10,481 voters were affected in areas where there were disturbances, but that the margin of lead between the top candidates was greater than the number of affected votes, making the result conclusive.

“I hereby certify that I am the returning officer for the Anambra governorship election,” Omoregie declared. “Having satisfied the requirements of the law and scored the highest number of votes, I declare Charles Chukwuma Soludo duly elected.”

He further confirmed that the APGA candidate met the constitutional requirement of scoring at least two-thirds of votes across the 21 local government areas of the state.

Reacting to the victory, APGA National Chairman, Barr. Sylvester Ezeokenwa, thanked Anambra voters for re-electing Soludo, describing the outcome as “a well-deserved victory.”

“This victory did not come as a surprise,” he said. “Governor Soludo has delivered on his campaign promises, and the people have reaffirmed their confidence in his leadership.”

Ezeokenwa, however, expressed regret that the party fell short of its target of winning all 21 local government areas, but assured that Soludo’s second term would deliver even greater achievements.

“This victory means more work ahead,” he added. “Anambra has not seen anything yet.”