TheCable

The hope of having the first elected female governor in Nigeria finally evaporated on Sunday, as the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Darius Ishiaku of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the winner of the governorship election in Taraba state.

Taraba is one of the three states where INEC declared the April 11 election inconclusive, and held supplementary election on Saturday.

Muhammad Kyari, the returning officer of the state, had announced that the election was marred with irregularities.

Kyari said the number of cancelled votes was more than the margin between the candidates who placed first and second.

At the time, Aisha Alhassan, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), polled 262, 368 votes behind Ishaku, who had 317, 198 votes.

This left a difference of 63,817 between the votes of the two candidates. Meanwhile, more than 100, 000 votes were cancelled.

However, when the result of the rescheduled election, which held in 10 local government areas was announced, Ishaku polled a total of 369,318 votes to defeat, Alhassan, who had 275,984 votes.

Fondly called Mama Taraba, Alhassan was the only female governorship candidate in the 2015 election.

She had earlier called for a cancellation of the entire poll, alleging that there was a grand scheme to rig in favour of her opponent.