₦airaland Forum

seunmsg:
For this one mind now, he will be president once there is electronic transmission of result. Abeg make i laugh small

"The limits of tyrants( anti - democratic elements) are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress" - Frederick Douglass.

IgOga:
It is easier to manipulate electronic voting than manual voting. If the government or the opposition get hold of the source code then the result can be easily manipulated...

Kemetian:
Maybe because she knows the Americans are remotely behind all the terrorism in the first place, so they can clean up their own mess better.

Lanretoye:
They are afraid of people that can alter jamb result,waec results. They can adulterate human beings where necessary,to alter election result from their room is PO

The House of Representatives had passed its own version of the bill in December 2025, which differs markedly from that of the Senate.

A potential act of subversion of the public good reared its head in the Senate’s rejection of the electronic transmission of election results in real time, from polling units to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) database, during its consideration of amendments to Electoral Act 2022 last Wednesday.

This was the most critical provision in the electoral reform bill placed before the National Assembly, which was arrived at through a painstaking engagement with and the consensus of stakeholders in the country.

This thus opens the window for a prospective manipulation of election results in 2027, that will constitute a subversion of the sovereign will of the people, and the certainty of widespread post-election litigations, which bodes ill for our democracy.

Yet, media reports indicate that a majority of senators voted to keep the electronic transmission in the amended bill, but which was rejected by the Senate leadership due to reason many find spurious and highly untenable, including the need to forestall a climate of electoral dissension and litigation.

Opposition political parties in Senate, led by Enyinnaya Abaribe, at a press briefing, said that even the report of the ad hoc committee contained the real time electronic transmission of results. This was confimed by one of its members, Abdul Ningi. Another member, Aminu Tambuwal, was at the briefing of the members of opposition parties.

The House of Representatives had passed its own version of the bill in December 2025, which differs markedly from that of the Senate; a development that now requires an harmonisation of the two versions for the onward transmission of a single bill to the President for assent.

We urge the House to insist on its version – embodying the will of the people and aggregate view of various stakeholders – as that to be forwarded to the President.

It was not surprising, therefore, that public outcry greeted the version of the bill passed by the Senate, especially from stakeholders, including opposition political parties and civil society organisations, which had vigorously pushed for the provision on the electronic transmission of results to enhance transparency and the integrity of Nigeria’s electoral processes and outcomes. One of the stakeholders described the Senate act as a “deliberate assault on electoral transparency.”

Section 60 (3) of the Electoral Act 2022, which the Senate retains in its version, states that, “The electoral officer shall transfer the results, including the number of accredited voters and the results of the ballot in a manner as prescribed by the Commission.”

This had led to the huge denunciation of the 2023 polls as a perversion of the public will, typified in the reported “technical glitch” that subverted the real-time transmission of results, making the outcome of the presidential poll highly contested and rejected in many quarters.

Nigeria’s electoral antecedents often reveal that results are altered at collation centres. This monstrosity is what the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) real time electronic transmission to its IReV Portal seeks to cure. No applause to the senators for not being comfortable with this attempt at crucial reform.

The amended Electoral Act – which is yet to be ready – would provide the legal framework for the conduct of the 2027 general elections. INEC chairman, Joash Amupitan, had last Wednesday decried the National Assembly’s delay in creating an enabling environment for the commission’s work – which has already been badly affected.

The first casualty of the lawmakers’ indecisiveness is INEC’s 360 days’ Notice of Election, which has been reduced to 180 days. This is irreversible due to time constraints.

Nigerians should resist the Senate’s non-altruistic embrace of ambiguities or loopholes in the version of the electoral law or guidelines it seeks to peddle, which preserves the status quo and is inimical to democratic consolidation in the country. In it, rather than endorse the proposed 10-year jail term penalty for vote-buying and selling initially proposed, it retained the two years in the old Act of 2022.

The Red Chamber’s subterfuge gradually became evident penultimate week when the seven-member ad hoc panel, chaired by Adeniyi Adegbonmire, constituted to examine the report of its Standing Committee on Electoral Matters and gather inputs and aggregate the opinions of senators, submitted its report last Tuesday. Instead of an open consideration of the latter report, as Senate President Godswill Akpabio had earlier promised, the senators went into a closed-door session for this.

In retrospect, the House of Representatives had passed the electoral reform bill in December 2025 and forwarded to the Senate for concurrence. But the House curiously returned to it for further deliberations, before it embarked on a two-week recess. The provisions of its passed bill were drafted to cure the controversies that the electronic transmission of results from polling units to the IReV in real time generated in the last election.

The Supreme Court had, in its post-election judgment of 2023, declared that the IReV Portal is not part of the collation system, if not entrenched in the Electoral Act. Besides, the adoption of the electronic transmission of results is to be expressly stipulated in the law also.

If these guardrails are not ulttimately codified in the amended electoral law, the Senate would have jettisoned clarity for opacity, and enabled the wiles of anti-democratic forces and opportunism at the expense of the national interest.

The Nigeria Civil Society Situation Room had held a protest in Abuja two weeks ago to pressure the Senate to do the needful. “The protest is not merely about one bill…it is about whether Nigeria’s democratic institutions can act with foresight and responsibility, rather than waiting until the eve of elections to scramble for reforms,” the group stated.

Other crucial provisions of the Electoral Act include, but are not limited to the following:

-1). The imposition of stiffer penalties for vote-buying, which would now attract between ₦2 million and ₦5 million in fines or a 10-year jail term;

-2). The fining of presiding officers who fail to stamp and sign the results they announce.

-3). Also, all the parties are required to submit electronic copies of their membership registers to INEC before conducting primaries to select candidates.

This would make it impossible for losers in one party primary to defect to other parties to pick or snatch tickets, which led to the high number of candidate substitutions and the resultant pre-election litigations following the 2023 elections.

At this point, PREMIUM TIMES makes bold to remind Mr Akpabio and his colleagues in the Senate of the wise counsel of a former Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, on democratic consolidation that: “The electoral process (must) be undergirded by two fundamental standards: credibility and integrity.”

This consciousness had underpinned the policy steps taken in the US after its presidential election of 2000, when electoral fraud in the State of Florida was flagged and investigated. Governor Jeb Bush thereafter signed the Florida Election Reform Act, 2001 into law, while federal reform bills were equally passed in both the House of Representatives and Senate to address the concerns that arose.

Elections have been held in Nigeria in which ballot papers were not serialised or numbered; or stamped and signed by presiding officers; and voters out-numbered those accredited to vote. Yet, INEC and the courts took their turns in declaring winners, which denied the electorates their rights of making such calls.

The public trust deficits arising thereof are still very much with us. These ought to have informed the making of unambiguous laws to return trust to our electoral processes, which the Senate appears bent on not doing, with its present attempt to subvert the popular will.

So far, the parliament since 1999 has altered Nigeria’s electoral law five times, which were subsequently sabotaged by politicians and INEC, necessitating the need for continuous reforms to the enabling legislation guidding elections in the country.

In very clear terms, the resolution to the present quandary demands that the country makes a clean break with its odious past.

Buhari and APC henchmen obviously love ballot snatching that favors them. After all, APC ballot snatchers in Lagos had a field day without the slightest consequences in the 2019 election. They only want to murder ballot snatchers that aren't APC thugs.

It is obvious that the 2023 election is already rigged more than a year before it will take place. But if they are allowed to get away with it again, forget about democracy ever taking roots. Nigeria would officially be a rigocracy.

Akpabio argued that calls for real-time electronic transmission of election results failed to take into account Nigeria’s infrastructure challenges, citing lack of electricity and internet access in many rural communities.

Following the backlash that trailed the recent amendment to the Electoral Act, the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, has summoned an emergency session for tomorrow, Tuesday, February 9, in a move to fast-track legislative action on the controversial Electoral Act Amendments Bill.

This was as prominent Nigerians including former Senate President, David Mark; Mr. Femi Falana, SAN, Dr Oby Ezekwesili, Prof Pat Utomi, Comrade Ayuba Wabba, Dr Usman Bugaje, Dr Bilikisu Magoro, Amb Nkoyo Toyo, Comrade Shehu Sanni, Comrade Ene Obi, and Olawale Okunniyi among others, have kicked against senate’s rejection of electronic transmission of results.

At the same time, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has urged the Senate to ensure that amended the Electoral Act provided unambiguous mandate for the Independent National Electoral Commission to electronically transmit and collate results from polling units in real-time.

A statement yesterday by the Clerk of the Senate, Emmanuel Odo, directed all senators to reconvene for the extraordinary sitting scheduled to commence at noon.

While the official notice did not state the reason for the sudden recall, investigations by THISDAY revealed that the emergency plenary is aimed at approving the Votes and Proceedings of the Senate’s last sitting. It is an essential procedural step to allow the conference committee on the Electoral Act amendments to commence work.

A ranking senator, who is also a principal officer, confirmed the development, noting that lawmakers had already received a circular from the presiding officer. The senator, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said, “We have been formally asked to reconvene on Tuesday to approve the Votes and Proceedings of our last legislative sitting.

“This is necessary to clear the way for the conference committee to begin work on the Electoral Act Amendments Bill.” The senator further hinted that the emergency session might begin behind closed doors, given the rising political tension surrounding provisions on the electronic transmission of election results.

“It is most likely that there will be an executive session before the main business of the day. The issue of electronic transmission of results has already generated serious tension within and outside the National Assembly,” he added.

The sudden recall came amid intense public scrutiny and mounting criticism from opposition parties, civil society groups and election observers, who had accused the National Assembly of attempting to dilute key reforms ahead of the 2027 general election.

The Senate and the House of Representatives are currently on a two-week recess, during which lawmakers are expected to engage ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) on the implementation of the 2026 budget

However, the decision to interrupt the recess underscores the urgency the Senate leadership attaches to resolving outstanding legislative issues on the Electoral Act, which is the legislation that will shape the conduct, credibility and integrity of future elections in Nigeria.

Political watchers say Tuesday’s emergency sitting could prove pivotal, as it might determine the final direction of electoral reforms and set the tone for the next phase of engagement between the National Assembly, the executive and the Nigerian electorate especially the issue of electronic transmission of election results.

Mark, Bugaje, Utomi, Falana, Wabba, Ezekwesili, Magori and Sanni, Others Kick
Prominent Nigerians, yesterday, kicked against senate’s rejection of electronic transmission of results ahead of the 2027 general poll.

A former Senate President and National Chairman of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Senator David Mark, has insisted that the ADC position was clear and non-negotiable on the matter. The exchange occurred at the public presentation of “The Burden of Legislators in Nigeria” held at the NAF Conference Centre, Abuja, where Mark chaired the occasion

During his address, Akpabio urged the ADC and other critics of the amendment process not to be in a hurry, stressing that the Senate had yet to conclude work on the Electoral Act amendment.

He argued that calls for real-time electronic transmission of election results failed to take into account Nigeria’s infrastructure challenges, citing lack of electricity and internet access in many rural communities. According to him, allowing such a provision in the law could negatively affect electoral outcomes.

Responding, Mark said the Senate President could not speak on behalf of the ADC, adding that the party’s demand—and that of many Nigerians—was straightforward.

Mark said there was no need for lengthy explanations or justifications, stressing that all the ADC was asking for was for the National Assembly to pass the amendment with provisions for real-time transmission of results, and allow the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to determine its feasibility. .........................