Following the official declaration of Saturday’s governorship election results in Osun State, an election monitoring group, YIAGA Africa, has said that the results reflected the ballots cast at the poll.
The group disclosed this on Sunday at its results verification press conference in Osogbo, the state capital.
Speaking through its board chair, Hussain Abdu, YIAGA Africa, said it believed the results declared by INEC represented the wishes of the people of Osun State.
Hussain said YIAGA’s belief in the official results rested on the strength of its Parallel Vote Tabulation Methodology deployed to monitor the election independently.
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He said they deployed 500 observers in pairs to a representative random sample of 250 polling units, with another 32 mobile observers deployed to all 30 local government areas (LGAs) and 30 LGA results collation centres.
His words: “This deployment strategy enabled YIAGA Africa to provide timely and accurate information on the election day processes. It began from the set-up, voter accreditation, voting, and counting to verify the official results independently for the Osun gubernatorial election as announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
“The process and results verification statement is based on reports from 247 to 250 (98%) sampled polling units in Osun State,” he added.
Hussain said the official results were consistent with its statistical projection enabled by its PVT methodology and, therefore, should be believed by all stakeholders.
“INEC’s official announcement on the votes cast for the 2022 Osun State gubernatorial election is consistent with the Yiaga Africa WTV estimated range (specifically, it falls within the Yiaga Africa’s WTV estimated range).
“Had the official results been changed at the ward, LGA, or state collation centres, the official results would not have fallen within the YIAGA Africa WTV estimated ranges.
“Because the official results fall within the estimated ranges, candidates, parties, and voters should have confidence the official results for the Osun 2022 gubernatorial election reflect the ballots cast at polling units on Saturday, July 16, 2022.”
The board chair added that the counting process at polling units was transparent and included representatives from the four political parties that received the most votes.
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