The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has said that the party should not be judged by the results of the recent by-elections held across 16 constituencies.
Elections were held on Saturday, August 16, to replace lawmakers who died or resigned following the 2023 general election.
According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) findings, the ADC did not win any seats, while the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) secured 12 of the 16 seats in nine states.
The All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) gained two seats in Anambra, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) one in Oyo, and the New Nigeria Peoples Party one in Kano.
Speaking on Channels Television’s ‘Politics Today’ on Wednesday, African Democratic Congress (ADC) spokesman Bolaji Abdullahi ascribed the party’s success to the time of the election and the ADC’s level of preparation.
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When asked why the ADC performed poorly in the by-election, Bolaji explained, “We’ve explained it, we’ve issued a statement, we’ve talked about it several times. For us, the election happened less than a month after we came into the party. Most of the candidates, we didn’t even know them, and that’s why we said we cannot judge the ADC by that.
“You’re just talking about us transitioning into establishing our real leadership at this time. So, the by-election that you talked about happened too early in terms of transition for the party. So, we don’t want to be judged by the outcome of that election; there are other elections coming, and we will be ready for those.”
Meanwhile, in its initial reaction to the election results, the ADC blamed its low performance on widespread violence and vote buying and claimed irregularities committed by the ruling party.
The party stated that the election was characterized by vote-buying, ballot box snatching, voter intimidation, violence, and an alleged failure of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, or BVAS.
