Omisore: Why I lost Osun Governorship Election

The candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, at the just concluded Osun State gubernatorial election, Iyiola Omisore, has attributed his defeat to the “clearly partisan” acts of the former Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, in the state. While speaking at his first post-election briefing in Osogbo, Monday, 11 August, 2014 Omisore said that by the time the electoral commissioner was removed, he had already done the damage. Rufus Akeju, the Osun State REC, was replaced by ,Mr Segun Agbaje, a few weeks before the election. ‎ At the end of the election, Mr. Omisore’s 292,747 votes was not enough to defeat Rauf Aregbesola, the incumbent governor and candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, who polled 394,684 votes to emerge winner. “It was not a race we came into unmindful of the odds stacked against us,” said Mr. Omisore, a former Senator. “For instance, we had a situation where a clearly partisan Resident Electoral Commissioner had opened the entire electoral system to our opponent from registration stage through data storage to personnel loading.