The Electoral Act 2022, which was amended by the National Assembly to become the Electoral Act 2026 in the midst of a significant controversy among those who believed the reforms were insufficiently comprehensive, has now been put to the test in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) of Abuja.
Owing to the relatively effective internet coverage of Abuja because it is urban,e-transmission of results from polling units to lReV was not reported to have failed.
Incidentally, the 2022 Electoral Act did not acknowledge electronic transmission, which was only documented in INEC’s electoral regulations. However, lawmakers in the tenth(10) assembly have incorporated electronic transmission into the amended Electoral Act 2026.
Mr. Mike Igini, an ex-INEC commissioner, had expressed concern that the lives of polling agents will be at risk if they are granted the authority to ascertain whether the internet is accessible in specific polling units. This is one of the reasons why he had opposed the use of form EC8A as a fallback option.
His thesis is that unscrupulous politicians may compel polling agents to unilaterally declare that internet service was poor to justify reliance on Form EC8A, which is susceptible to manipulation, as a result of the insignificant changes in the amended law. The law has now transitioned from the prohibition of the electronic transmission of election results to the amendment to accommodate the transmission electronically, with a caveat to fall back on Form EC8A. The fear was that if this occurred, the polling agents could end up at risk of harm at the hands of desperate politicians.
Incidentally, Mr.lgini, the highly principled INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC for Akwa Ibom state in 2019, whose tenacious prosecution of an election Returning Officer, Prof Peter Ogban, resulted in his conviction for the electoral offence of manipulating results, has many Nigerians advocating for the exclusive use of electronic transmission of results with the elimination of reliance on Form EC8A.
It is rather befuddling and perplexing that some Nigerians believe that relying solely on technology is the only solution to election rigging, even though it has been proven and is obvious that technology can be easily hacked.
During his appearance at an Arise TV interview on the day of the amendment, Mr. Igini spoke about how a previous state government blocked internet access, causing people in that jurisdiction to be unaware of election results, which leads us to a hypothetical scenario:
What if a politician decides to do the same in an unfavourable region or zone, making it impossible to send election results electronically to lReV.
It’s amazing that, even though technology can easily be used to jam the internet, making electronic transmission of results impossible, such that there is no need to hold the polling officer hostage, let alone kill the person, as feared by lgini, real-time e-transmission advocates still insist on its exclusive use for the 2027 elections.
To put things in context, Iran just cut down internet connectivity in that country to prevent protesting youths from engaging in social media interactions.
Based on the experience described above, manipulating elections is even more possible when they are solely driven by technology, especially if the vote is conducted manually rather than electronically. In light of the foregoing, I’d want to restate my former viewpoint in this column last week: “Let’s Think Out Of The Box And Not Engage In Herd Mentality”
The existential reality is that real-time election results transmission will not solve our electoral system’s rigging problem. Nigeria’s election integrity is hindered by vote-buying, a lack of sanctioning tribunals, and the judicial system’s negative role in determining public office holders, which usurps the role of the electorate after voting.
Furthermore, confidence will be reposed in the electoral system if the burden of proof to show that the results have not been tampered with by INEC officials, who are frequently involved in election manipulation, rests on them.
With harsh punishments hovering over INEC officials’ heads like the Sword of Damocles, the credibility of our election process may improve significantly. However, the underlying obstacles that democracy advocates should have addressed were generally neglected in favour of a frantic demand for the exclusive real-time electronic transfer of election results from polling stations to lReV.
Given the factors listed above, I would recommend that politically conscious Nigerians adopt a more expansive perspective by conducting a thorough search for solutions, rather than becoming narrow-minded and inadvertently becoming echo chambers for opposition politicians whose agendas may be self-serving, unaltruistic, and unclear.
Intriguingly, certain proponents of the exclusive reliance on electronic transmission of results from polling units to IReV justify their stance by asserting that they are anticipating the actions of political actors whom they accuse of corruption by falsifying figures in the Form EC8A during the 2023 general elections. They think that the misconduct can be resolved by eliminating human interaction in the results collation process through real-time electronic transmission of results.
In their opinion, anticipating the future involves second-guessing the alleged vote robbers and devising strategies to thwart their criminal schemes. Therefore, they are weeping, agonising, and hurling outbursts because they are unable to achieve their desired outcome, as President Bola Tinubu has promptly signed the amended act. However, the reality that they failed to consider is that the so-called election criminals are already devising strategies to manipulate the elections in 2027 through the use of technology.
Did INEC not guarantee Nigerians before the 2023 general elections that BVAS and lReV are the cure-all for elections? Was the promise fulfilled in that way? In view of the foregoing, why are those advocating for real-time e-transmission relying on INEC’s reported brag of 93% internet coverage in its polling locations during the previous administration?
What is it, if not pure naivety? In reality, one of the most significant impediments to the CBN’s cashless economy plan was the fear of the high risk and vulnerability of technology to cybercrime while maintaining the safety and security of their money.
The fear is real, as evidenced by the substantial losses of funds that have resulted from cyber fraud, which is the result of hacking and other technology-related offences, as attested to by risk managers in banks.c
Available records indicate that Nigeria has suffered substantial losses as a result of cyber fraud, as evidenced by data from the Nigeria Interbank Settlement Systems, and the Central Bank of Nigeria, among other sources. The quantum of funds lost to fraud has increased by 350% in the past five years, from N11.61 billion in 2020 to N52.26 billion in 2024.
Between January 2023 and April 2025, Nigeria may have suffered a loss of over N320 billion due to financial fraud, with 92% of these incidents being associated with digital transactions, mobile money, or fintech platforms.
In contrast to the ease with which banks can mitigate their risks through insurance packages in the event of a breach that results in the loss of customer funds through cyber fraud, what type of insurance can INEC or politicians implement to ensure against electoral fraud? This includes the possibility of cybercriminals hacking the lReV or jamming the system, which would prevent the transmission of results from the voting units to the lReV.
The question that arises from the aforementioned is: Is the fascination of Nigerians with the sole reliance on real-time e-transmission of election results and the exclusion of a fallback on Form EC8A due to the ignorance or brainwashing of the gullible electorate by opposition parties intent on torpedoing the forthcoming 2027 general elections?
It is truly remarkable how certain individuals can be so paralysed by the dread of a perceived crime that they fail to consider alternative methods of preventing the risk of election fraud. Is it not astonishing that rational individuals would place their complete trust in the electronic transmission of results, a system that has already been demonstrated to be highly vulnerable, given the knowledge we have about the vulnerability of technology to compromise by cyber fraudsters?
Prof. Mike Ikhariale, a constitutional law expert who studied at Harvard University, observed in a comment during the turbulent debates between lawmakers regarding the amendment of the 2022 electoral act in the 2026 electoral act, that the argument should not be emotionally charged or negatively speculative, which appears to have been the case. In his opinion, those who advocate for “real-time transmission” only serve as a reminder of the old Astro-Hungarian empire, which, fearing mortality, committed suicide.
Therefore, in his opinion, the opposition’s political actors will be committing suicide if they are to rely on unreliable technology as the sole platform for managing their votes.
He then pondered why those who are interested in exclusive real-time transmission are unable to observe this. I concur with his assessment. Fortunately, the Nigerian Senate, which is akin to the palm wine tapper in the village, and can observe the entire community from the top of the tree he climbs to extract the wine, thereby having a more comprehensive perspective than any other member of the community, weighed in with superior wisdom. Fortuitously, the Senate recognised what the members of the House of Representatives (HoR) did not figure out when they initially approved real-time e-transmission of election results and shared their knowledge with their junior partners.
Consequently, the prefix “real-time” has been eliminated from the amended 2022 electoral act after the upper and lower chambers members engaged in a dialogue to harmonize their positions. In addition, the most senior INEC polling officer, with the concurrence of representatives of the security agencies and political parties’ agents on site, will now be responsible for determining whether or not there is an internet connection for electronic transmission. There is a penalty for false declaration.
In reality, the Nigerian electoral process is still in the developmental phase and will continue to improve, irrespective of the political party in power. Nigeria has undergone numerous electioneering processes throughout history, as Bolade Agbola, another acquaintance, noted. The evolution encompasses the following:
(1) The first general elections that were conducted in 1966, which marked the beginning of an era of ballot box theft and stuffing with false ballot papers.
(2) The era of the collation centres (FEDECO state headquarters) where falsification of results could occur which is a consequence of the use of ward collating centers.
(3) In 2007, the use of forensic reports to overturn results and the thumb printing of ballot papers at polling centers occurred which happened in Osun and Ekiti states are also processs that lend themselves to electoral fraud.
Given the poor record of past experiences highlighted above, there is no doubt that the 2023 electoral process can be classified as one of the finest in our history, given the referenced electioneering experiences before 2023.
The aforementioned assertion is further supported by the fact that IReV operated flawlessly during the gubernatorial, National Assembly, and State Assembly elections, despite its failure to perform during the presidential election.
The IReV portal eventually received the presidential election results, despite the initial transmission errors.
Democracy does not entail the acquisition of a perfect majority of ballots on a global scale. The difference between the victor and the loser may be as small as a single vote. Understandably, the loss of an election is a traumatic experience for candidates; however, it is important to acknowledge the unique characteristics of our nation, which is characterised by inadequate internet and electricity infrastructure.
The election that resulted in the presidency of George W. Bush in the United States was the subject of controversy when the state of Florida implemented manual vote tallying. The results of the 2020 election, in which the immediate past president Joe Biden defeated the then incumbent president Donald Trump, were disputed to the point that Trump’s supporters invaded Capitol Hill, the US seat of legislative power, with the intention of abducting and hanging the then vice president Mike Pence and then speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi who the aggrieved Republican voters unsuccessfully attempted to dissuade from endorsing the result they were disputing.
In the words of Jordan Peterson, a Canadian psychologist and professor who is renowned for his provocative perspectives on the significance of truth and intellectual responsibility: “Truth is a commitment. Truth is a duty. The intellectual who refuses to defend it has surrendered the very purpose of learning”
In Nigeria, we acquire knowledge daily, and this is especially true of our electoral system, which has undergone significant changes since the era of ballot box stuffing and theft.
Before now, the electioneering process has been conducted entirely manually up to about 2011/2015 when BVAS and lReV were introduced until now, when a hybrid of technological systems and manual operations is driving the system.
Perhaps electronic voting, diaspora voting, and voting by mail systems will have been incorporated into the electoral laws of our land through another amendment by the 2031 election cycle, when the internet and electricity infrastructure in our country are anticipated to have become more robust and reliable. By that time the malady of low voter turnout, which has been the subject of much lamentation and agony among commentators on our electoral system, may be alleviated by the inclusion of the aforementioned voting options when these additional windows are opened.
I find it disappointing, disheartening, and even abhorrent that INEC, as well as political parties and even civil society organisations, have not conducted any research that focuses on how more electors can fulfil their civic responsibilities.
Rather the emphasis has been on the reasons why the election process will be exclusively influenced by technology, despite its established disadvantages.
The individuals who advocate for a complete reliance on technology are inclined to believe that the sole issues plaguing our electoral system are vote manipulation and the mutilation of result sheets by unscrupulous politicians. That is a flawed assumption.
The truth is that the crime of vote buying which has reached a near pandemic level is also a major culprit.
Unbeknownst to many Nigerians, since they did not clamor for it, electronic voting, diaspora, and voting by mail, which have not yet become integral components of the electoral system, could be the definitive solution to the challenge of lack of trust in the system. The inclusion of these options could restore the integrity of our elections, as the electorate would have the option to fall back on as their alternative ways of voting, and begin to believe that their vote will be taken into account.
My argument is that more votes may be recorded if those who are reluctant to vote because of violence at polling stations can vote from the comfort of their own homes when it is included in the electoral act if amended. Similarly, a significant number of Nigerians in the diaspora could vote if it were also included in the electoral act much the same way that voting by mail can boost voter turnout if it is permitted. That is because voters who registered at home but are unable to vote due to duty calls or local or foreign travels outside of the location where they registered could also exercise their options via voting by mail.
In my opinion, that is the surest way to increase the number of Nigerians willing to vote and actually voting, rather than relying solely on real-time e-transmission of election results, which all stakeholders appeared to be fixated on without considering the other options outlined above.
Meanwhile, the polls held over the weekend in the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, as well as by-elections in Kano and Rivers states, serve as the first test of the Electoral Act 2026’s performance.
Unfortunately, the most vocal opposition party, the African Democratic Congress, ADC, failed to live up to its promise that it would unseat the incumbent All Progressives Congress, APC, in 2027 and take the presidency of Aso Rock Villa.
With the incumbent APC winning five (5) of the councils and the PDP securing one (1) of the six (6) chairperson seats up for grabs in Abuja, it appears that the PDP has outperformed the ADC, which is starting to look like a paper tiger.
Analysts were focusing on the Abuja council and the Kano and Rivers by-elections as a referendum on President Bola Tinubu’s administration, in what appears to be the equivalent of midterm elections in the United States. These elections are anticipated to be a referendum on the love or hate of President Trump and his revolutionary Make America Great Again (MAGA) ideology.
It is evident that the predictions of doom and dread regarding the ruling APC were wrong, as the ruling party’s candidates emerged victorious in the FCT, Abuja, Kano, and Rivers states.
As such, it is clear that the APC continues to be the dominant party. The opposition is still in the process of catching up, as it has included 31 of the 36 governors in its platform. The PDP, which has the second-highest number of state governors and legislators, is the only opposition party to have won an election in the contest in Abuja, last week. The ruling party in the center, APC won the largest number of seats in the elections in Abuja, Kano, and Rivers states.
Even though the Labour Party (LP) and the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) each have one state in the eastern region of the country, they were unable to win any of the contests in Abuja. How could the ADC and the New Nigerian People Party (NNPP), which have no state governors in their coalition, make any significant impact? What implications does this have for the 2027 general elections?
In my opinion, governors are significant in elections, and it is a counter narrative to the assertion made by the opposition parties, particularly the ADC, that governors and legislators can defect to the ruling APC, and on election day, the electorate will vote for the ADC, which by all indications at the moment appears to be unprepared and not on the ground, but a mere paper tiger or social media party. This is evident in the mischievous hashtags that some of their traducers have recently used.
Magnus Onyibe, an entrepreneur, public policy analyst, author, democracy advocate, development strategist, an alumnus of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, Massachusetts, USA, a Commonwealth Institute scholar, and a former commissioner in the Delta State government, sent this piece from Lagos.
