Program Director of YIAGA Africa, Cynthia Mbamalu has revealed that vote buying and inducement began days before the recently concluded elections in Ondo State.

Mbamalu, speaking on Channels Television's Morning Brief on Monday, November 18, mentioned that voters were offered as much as ₦20,000 to cast their vote for a specific candidate.

She noted that voter inducement had "commenced early with both food items and then most importantly, money giving out"

Earlier, the election monitoring group condemned the incidences of vote buying that characterized the election.

According to INEC’s declaration, PDP’s candidate Agboola Ajayi came a distant second with total votes of 117,845 behind the winner, Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa of the All Progressives Congress (APC) who polled 366,781 votes.

"And by the way, vote buying was actually quite an eyesore in these elections. Data did show that in some locations, you had vote buying that was as high as ₦20,000 per voter. The least amount we recorded was ₦5,000. So it was between ₦5,000, ₦10,000, ₦20,000 that was paid," Mbamalu said.

"The voter inducement had commenced early with both food items and then most importantly, money giving out. And I think this is one of the things we're beginning to see in our elections," she continued.

"You had voters complaining to observers, even some international observers. Some of them were open saying, oh, we were giving this, we promised this, and we're giving less amount, or openly collecting the money. You had instances, if you look at our data also, you see instances where we highlighted that we had voters who, after thumbprinting, were showing their ballot papers to party agents," she added

Meanwhile, the opposing Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described the polls in Ondo as ‘a sham’ and the worst election ever conducted by the Independent National Electoral Election (INEC).

This was made known by its National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, on Sunday, November 17 stressing that it was reviewing the outcome of the poll.

“The Peoples Democratic Party and indeed all lovers of democracy in Nigeria and across the world have just witnessed the worst election conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

“The November 16, 2024, Governorship election in Ondo State runs short of all expectations and requirements of a free, fair and credible election as it witnessed the height of electoral swindle, deceit and manipulation by the All Progressives Congress (APC),” the statement read in part.