Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu has been re-elected Lagos governor in an election marred by intimidation and low turn-out of voters.
With 95 per cent of votes counted, Governor Sanwo Olu of the ruling All Progressive Congress had more than 736,000 votes, compared to just 292,000 for his closest rival, the Labour Party’s Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, according to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The turnout was just a small fraction of the 7 million registered voters. The Lagos election was the highest profile among races for powerful governorships in 28 of Nigeria’s 36 states, as well as for state assemblies across the country.
The race in Lagos had been expected to be close after opposition Labour candidate Peter Obi received the most votes in the state during last month’s disputed presidential election, which was won overall by Bola Tinubu of the APC but Sanwo-Olu managed to deliver a landslide victory.
Tinubu himself is a former Lagos governor, who ran the state from 1999-2007 and has since been seen as instrumental in picking his successors there including Sanwo-Olu.
