The Ondo State Independent Electoral Commission (ODIEC) has presented certificates of return to the newly elected chairmen who emerged victorious during Saturday’s local government election in the state.
While the chairmen-elect received their certificates at the commission’s headquarters in Oba-Ile, Akure North Local Council Area of the state, ODIEC Chairman Joseph Aremo stated that the election was conducted across the state in accordance with the law guiding the electoral body.
Forty-eight hours before the election, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had pulled out of the process over what it described as a lack of credibility on the part of ODIEC.
The All Progressives Congress (APC) won all 18 chairmanship and 203 councillorship seats. Aremo added that the election was contested by 12 political parties.
He said: “The election across the 203 wards was keenly contested, and candidates sponsored by APC emerged as councillors-elect in the 2025 local government election of Ondo State.
“Also, for the chairmanship election as well, it was keenly contested, and from presentations made at the respective LG levels, the candidates of APC emerged as winners across all the 18 councils.”
Show of shame
Meanwhile, the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in the state has called for the cancellation of Saturday’s election.
While describing the election as a “show of shame,” the SDP chairman, during a press briefing in Akure, alleged that there was harassment and intimidation by agents of the APC.
He said, “We want to condemn the ‘selection 2.0’ that took place in Ondo State on Saturday. There was no election in the state as far as we are concerned because what happened was a pure show of shame, and that is why we are calling for the immediate cancellation of the poll.
“Also, we are calling for the removal or honourable resignation of the State Chairman, ODIEC, Joseph Aremo; he deserves not to be among the honourables. We’ve engaged him, and he assured us as a political party that he was going to be a fair umpire. But it’s unfortunate that he didn’t do as he had promised.
“We call for the cancellation of the poll because all the polling units across the 18 local governments were flooded with all manner of irregularities, and electoral officers were not given the sheets to write the results of the election, yet they were announcing APC candidates as winners when they did not even tell us the results.
“We condemn the election based on the lack of strict adherence to the rules guiding the election by ODIEC; they did not provide forms for the electoral officers; they just gave them plain sheets of paper to write the results of the election at the Collation Centres, and it’s a pure breach of the rules that guided the election in the state.”
