The Edo State Independent Electoral Commission (EDSIEC) has declared candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC) winners of all 18 local government chairmanship positions and all 192 councillorship seats contested in Saturday’s local government elections, cementing the ruling party’s grip on every tier of governance in the state.
Announcing the results at a news conference at the commission’s headquarters in Benin City on Sunday, EDSIEC Chairman Jonathan Aifuobhokhan said the elections were conducted in accordance with the provisions of the Edo State Local Government Electoral Law and other relevant electoral guidelines.
He explained that accreditation, voting, sorting, counting, collation, and declaration of results were carried out in accordance with the Edo State Local Government Electoral Law 2022, as amended in 2026, and other applicable regulations.
He noted that the electoral process was completed across all 18 local government areas and their 192 wards. Aifuobhokhan did not provide a breakdown of votes scored by the parties in each local government area.
Aifuobhokhan expressed satisfaction with the conduct of the commission’s returning officers, describing them as professional and impartial in discharging their statutory duties.
He said the election was conducted peacefully across the state, though minor operational challenges in a few locations did not substantially affect the overall conduct or outcome of the exercise.
He urged anyone with grievances arising from the results to seek redress through the appropriate legal process, rather than through street protest or unrest.
While the vote proceeded largely without incident, turnout was notably low across many parts of the state, with a number of polling units recording only a handful of voters throughout the day. Security personnel had been deployed to polling units statewide, and electoral officials arrived early at many voting centers.
Governor Monday Okpebholo himself cast his ballot at Udomi Primary School in Esan Central Local Government Area, where he praised residents for their peaceful conduct and voiced satisfaction with the process.
Aifuobhokhan also commended Governor Okpebholo for giving the commission a free hand to carry out its constitutional responsibilities and praised political parties, candidates, traditional rulers, religious leaders, civil society groups, community leaders, youth and women’s organizations, and the electorate for their peaceful conduct throughout the exercise.
The EDSIEC chairman said winners would be presented with their certificates of return on Monday.
Saturday’s sweep extends the APC’s dominance in Edo politics, arriving just months after the party also won the state’s governorship election, giving it uncontested control over every local government council in the state.
The result mirrors a broader pattern seen in many Nigerian states, where the party controlling the governorship also tends to dominate state-organized local government elections, a dynamic that has long drawn criticism from opposition parties and civil society groups, who argue that state electoral commissions (unlike the federally run INEC) often lack full independence from the governors who appoint their leadership.
The APC has not publicly responded to any such criticism in relation to this particular outcome, and no legal challenges had been filed as of Sunday.
WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW
The APC’s clean sweep of all 18 chairmanship seats and 192 councilorship positions in Edo’s local government election underscores the party’s near-total consolidation of power in the state, coming on the heels of its earlier governorship win.
Despite EDSIEC’s assurance of a peaceful, lawfully conducted process, the result was achieved against a backdrop of notably low voter turnout, a detail that invites scrutiny over how representative the outcome truly is, especially given long-standing concerns about the independence of state-run electoral commissions from sitting governors.
