INEC not under pressure to declare poll inconclusive, says Jega

The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega on Sunday  said the agency  was not under pressure to declare the results of Saturday’s  Presidential and National Assembly elections inconclusive.

He also said the collation and release of the results  of the elections will begin on Monday.

Jega said the results from two states were received Sunday night although reports indicated that the ongoing collation process had reached 80 per cent and 90 per cent in some states.

He however dismissed claims by the Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Council that the party was leading in 23 states.

Jega, who made the submissions, at a briefing in Abuja on the status of the outcome of Saturday’s elections, said contrary to insinuations, the Card Readers worked in most of the nation’s 150,000 Polling Units.

He said failure of Card Readers was recorded in 374 Polling Units out of 150,000 in the country.

“We are not under any pressure to declare elections inconclusive. I wonder who will be interested in declaring inconclusive election. I want to believe that candidates would have wanted to be declared winners and not to have an election being declared inconclusive. Really, there is no truth whatsoever to that. “

The INEC chairman said the collation and release of results would begin today(Monday).

He said only results of two states were ready as at press time.