Nigeria 2023 election: Bola Tinubu declared winner | Elections News

Ali Mohammed Ali, a member of the All Progressives Congress (APC), told Al Jazeera he was not surprised by the opposition’s decision to bring the election results to court and dismissed claims that the results were rigged.

“We had wished they had not taken that route because the election was conducted free and fair as far we could see, but if they insist they want to take that route we welcome them and let’s meet them in court,” Ali said.

The APC member also acknowledged some of the concerns related to votes not being transmitted electronically as it was previously planned. But noted that despite some glitches in the system the results were valid.

“We certainly understand some of these concerns, we also wished the election results were transmitted in real-time, but that doesn’t invalidate the results because as the electoral body explained every polling unit’s result would be computed and then an agent would certify that this is an authentic result and pictures would be taken. And all agents agreed that all the results at the polling units were genuine,” he said.

“In the history of Nigerian elections, every cycle, every looser … without variation … they would insist that they lost because they have been ‘rigged out’ – this time is no different,” he added when asked about allegations of collusion between his party and electoral officials.