Security forces fired in the air and used teargas across Nigeria's largely Muslim north on Monday to try to quell protests over the election victory of President Goodluck Jonathan.
The vote count showed Jonathan, from the southern oil-producing Niger Delta, had beaten Muhammadu Buhari, a former military ruler from the north, in the first round.
Observers have called the poll the fairest in decades in Africa's most populous nation but Buhari's supporters accuse the ruling party of rigging. Results show how politically polarised the country is, with Buhari sweeping states in the Muslim north and Jonathan winning the largely Christian south.
Plumes of smoke rose into the air in parts of the northern city of Kaduna as protesters set fire to barricades of tyres. Groups of youths shouted "We want Buhari, we want Buhari".
Residents in the town of Zaria said a church was burned overnight and soldiers dispersed scuffles between rival supporters at the gates of the Emir's palace.
"They have destroyed our cars and our houses. I had to run for my life and I am now in my neighbour's house," said Dora Ogbebor a resident of the town of Zaria whose origins are in the south.
Soldiers used whips to disperse people gathering in the streets of Kano, the most populous city in the north. Gunfire broke out in one neighbourhood and protesters hurled stones.
An armoured personnel carrier, armed police and soldiers formed a barricade around the electoral commission office.
"We will have the situation under control soon," said Agbo Omaji, a police inspector securing the electoral office.
Soldiers fired in the air and helicopters flew overhead in the central city of Jos, where thousands have been killed in sectarian violence over the past decade.
Clear Win
Nigeria has a history of rigged and violent elections but Saturday's vote was deemed by many Nigerians, and foreign observers, to have been a vast improvement on the past, with the voting process orderly and little unrest on the day itself.
"Election day showed a generally peaceful and orderly process," said chief European Union election observer Alojz Peterle. EU observers said 2007 elections were not credible.
Peterle called for restraint in northern Nigeria and said all Nigerians should respect the election process.
A Reuters tally of results put Jonathan on nearly 23 million votes to just over 12 million for Buhari. The Independent National Electoral Commission was expected to announce all the results on Monday and to formally declare Jonathan the winner.
The outright win for Jonathan could ease worries over potential disruptions to crude exports from Africa's biggest oil and gas industry -- far away from the disturbances in the north.
It could also lift local financial markets which had been unnerved by the prospect of a potential run-off and the All-Share Index was up over 2 percent in early trade to its highest in nearly a month.
But Buhari's camp -- which had urged its supporters throughout the campaign to make sure their votes counted -- said some results looked suspicious, especially where turnout had been exceptionally high in some of Jonathan's strongholds.
"In most of the southeast and south-south, no real elections took place," former government minister Nasir el-Rufai, a Buhari supporter, told Reuters late on Sunday.
"In the southwest and the north, the results have no relation to what happened at the polling units and we will prove it in due course," he said.
Buhari, who also lost elections in 2003 and 2007, has repeatedly said Nigerians would not accept another rigged vote. He told Reuters on Saturday he would not go to court to challenge the outcome but that his party may chose to do so.
Reuters
Not less than 10 people have been killed while cars, houses and other valuables were destroyed in the aftermath of the presidential polls in different parts of Bauchi State. The violence also extended to Gombe State, as supporters of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) protested against what they said was the collusion between electoral officers and the ruling PDP in the state to deny their party victory in the state. Although attempts to burn the private home of the state governor, Danjuma Goje was foiled, the protesters razed the home of the state chairman of the PDP and those of his neighbours.
The mostly young protesters are displeased that the PDP recorded about 32 percent of the votes counted in the state and they blame the state government for this.
In Bauchi, the campaign office of the Bauchi State Governor, Isa Yuguda located on Ran Road was completely burnt down while several vehicles belonging to PDP agents were also burnt by the irate youth who blocked the main Ahmadu Bello Way leading to the Sa’adu Zungur Model School which served as the collation centre for the presidential election.
In Azare, angry youth set the house of the Bauchi State chairman of the PDP, Ibrahim Yaro-Yaro, on fire as well as the house of the Deputy National Secretary of the party, Musa Babayo just as other structures belonging to PDP members were torched.
Security cordon
In Misau, reports have it that the family house of the secretary to the state government, Ibrahim Dandija was torched by the youth while a youth corps member, who was an electoral official in one of the polling centres, was beaten at his station during the exercise and is now receiving treatment at an undisclosed hospital in Bauchi.
In Alkaleri, the youth unleashed terror on people, setting buildings and cars ablaze just as the Chairman of Kirfi Local Government Council, Ibrahim Galadima and that of Bauchi LGC, Sabo Abdullahi Mohammed were molested while their vehicles were destroyed.
In Wuntin-Dada and Guru Area of Bauchi metropolis, three people were killed by the youth who questioned why the PDP won in some of the polling units in the area, just as two more people were killed in the Kofar-Dumi area of the Bauchi metropolis with pockets of houses and cars also torched in the areas.
Armed soldiers as well as anti-riot policemen have been deployed to strategic locations in Bauchi to maintain peace. A police source said a number of the protesters have been arrested by the State Police Command which, however, has not made any public comments on the violence.
Calls to the Commissioner of Police, John Abakasanga and the command’s spokesperson, Mohammad Barau were not answered as at the time of going to press.
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