By Tife Owolabi

YENAGOA, Nigeria (Reuters) -Nigerians have been nonetheless voting in just a few elements of the nation after glitches prevented them from doing so on Saturday, however outcomes of the nationwide election would begin to be introduced from 6 p.m. (1700 GMT) the electoral fee stated.

Counting was already underway within the West African oil exporting nation’s presidential and parliamentary elections, with the ultimate tally anticipated inside 5 days.

Fee chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, instructed a information briefing within the capital Abuja that collated outcomes from a handful of Nigeria’s 36 states can be introduced from Sunday night.

The race to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari was anticipated to be the closest in Nigeria’s historical past, with candidates from two events which have alternated in energy because the finish of military rule in 1999 going through an unusually robust problem from a minor celebration candidate in style amongst younger voters.

A Reuters reporter noticed folks casting their votes at polling stations in Yenagoa metropolis, in Nigeria’s oil-producing south, the place polling couldn’t happen in some elements on Saturday as a result of election officers and supplies didn’t arrive.

In a single, voters stood on sandy, weed-choked floor checking for his or her names plastered on a half-built concrete home.

“The expertise was the yesterday it was a horrible factor,” Freedom Amienyo, a 59-year-old civil servant, stated after voting.

“However right now they tried to redeem the scenario and we’ve come train our franchise, which makes me blissful”.

Voting was additionally anticipated to proceed in some elements of northeastern Borno state after voting machines didn’t work.

It was not clear what number of of Nigeria’s 93 million registered voters have been unable to forged a poll on Saturday.

In most elements of the nation of 200 million folks, voting went easily. Regardless of scattered incidents of violence and intimidation, this was not on the size of earlier elections.

There have been studies of violence within the northern state of Kano on Sunday, the place an armed group attacked a collation centre within the city of Takai, earlier than safety forces arrived, stated Rakiya Muhammad, an election observer who witnessed the incident.

THREE HORSE RACE

The principle presidential contenders are former Lagos governor Bola Tinubu, 70, of the ruling All Progressives Congress, former vice chairman Atiku Abubakar, 76, of the primary opposition Peoples Democratic Get together, and former Anambra State governor Peter Obi, 61, of the smaller Labour Get together.

Outgoing President Buhari, a retired military basic who was additionally as soon as a navy ruler within the Nineteen Eighties, is stepping down after successful two earlier elections and serving the utmost eight years permitted by the structure.

Whoever wins will face a litany of crises gripping Africa’s high oil producer and the continent’s most populous nation.

Nigeria is fighting Islamist insurgencies within the northeast, an epidemic of kidnappings for ransom, battle between herders and farmers, shortages of money, gasoline and energy, in addition to deep-rooted corruption and poverty.

“I witnessed the worst expertise of my life beneath this administration. Not too long ago I spent two days with out consuming something,” stated Ahmad Sulaiman, 49, who sells purses in a market, as he stood within the baking solar in a dusty alleyway in Kano metropolis.

“I voted as a result of I needed change,” he added, declining to say who he had voted for.