It is becoming increasingly clear that the 2027 general elections may have been
won and lost even before the first ballot is cast. Nine months before the polls,
the 2026 Electoral Act Amendment Bill, signed into Law on February 18 this
year by President Bola Tinubu, contains several ‘landmines’ that those in
opposition political parties were either too busy to detect or were ignorant of
while the bill was before members of the National Assembly.
Months before the Electoral Bill was signed into law, many of those in
opposition were so consumed by the need to insert a clause into the bill that
would allow for real-time transmission of results that they failed to notice
several loopholes in the bill. Yet, many of them are Lawyers and Senior
Advocates, but they could not take the time to go through the details of what the
National Assembly, dominated by members of the ruling All Progressive
Congress (APC), were cooking against them.
Few months to the conduct of the 2027 general elections, some of the
opposition political figures have now woken up from their slumber and are
calling for a fresh amendment of a law that has just recently been passed.
Former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, raised the red flag against some of the
provisions of the Electoral Act last week when he called for an urgent
amendment of the Act, with a warning that a critical provision poses a threat to
the integrity of future elections in the country. Atiku, in a statement signed by
his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, raised
concerns over Section 63 of the Act, particularly the clause that allows a ballot
paper without an official mark to be counted at the discretion of a Returning
officer. Describing the provision as a “grave and dangerous ambiguity’’, Atiku
said it creates room for manipulation and could undermine the credibility of the
electoral process. “This is not a minor technical issue – it is a direct threat to
electoral integrity,” he said, stressing that any system that leaves ballot
validation to subjective judgment invites dispute and potential abuse. “A
democracy cannot survive on ambiguity. A ballot must either meet the standard,
or it does not. The moment such a critical decision is left to discretion, it opens
the door to manipulation and chaos,” he added.
While noting that the provision may have been intended to prevent voter
disenfranchisement, Atiku argued that its current wording is overly broad and
weakens public confidence in the system. “At a time when Nigerians demand
transparency and credibility, it is risky to retain a clause that undermines trust in
the very foundation of democracy – the vote.” he said. Atiku is not alone in the
call for a fresh amendment to the 2026 Electoral Act.
A former Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) of the Independent National
Electoral Commission (INEC), Mike Igini, has also raised concerns that
Nigeria’s 2027 general elections could be undermined if key provisions of the
Electoral Act are not urgently reviewed. Igini, again, pointed to Sections 63,
137, and 138 of the Law as major vulnerabilities that could enable electoral
manipulation, weaken accountability, and shift election outcomes from polling
units to the courtrooms.
According to him, Section 63 of the Electoral Act 2026, which deals with the
rejection of ballot papers without official marks, grants excessive discretion to
electoral officers. He pointed specifically to subsection 2, which states that a
ballot paper without an official security feature of INEC should be counted if
the Returning Officer is “satisfied” that it originated from the appropriate ballot
book. Let me quote Igini: “With that Section of the Act, the presiding officer
has been given the discretion to accept a ballot paper notwithstanding the
absence of an official mark and to count that ballot paper. What that means is
that before this election, politicians who have access to the security features of
INEC ballots are going to print their ballot papers.” He described the provision
as “dangerous.”
Igini also criticised Section 137, which outlines persons entitled to present
election petitions, arguing that it shields electoral officials from direct
accountability. The provision states that where a petitioner complains about the
conduct of an electoral officer, it is not necessary to join that officer in the
petition, as INEC would defend the case on their behalf. According to Igini, this
framework weakens accountability mechanisms. “Some unscrupulous members
of our Commission gave the security features of ballot papers to politicians.
When INEC went to the court to say that the document is not its document, the
tribunal upheld a forged document.”
Commenting on Section 138, which states that: “An act or omission which may
be contrary to an instruction or directive of the commission or of an officer
appointed for the purpose of election but which is not contrary to the provision
of this Act shall not of itself be a ground for questioning the election.” Igini said
Section 138 has been “one of the rigging provisions that we have cried out to be
removed,” adding that the instructions and directives of INEC are contained in
its regulations and guidelines.
Igini also raised concerns about Section 138(2) of the Act, which limits the
grounds upon which election results can be challenged. “They (the law) are
saying that presiding officers and assistant presiding officers can abandon it,” he
said, referring to INEC’s regulations and guidelines, which, he argued, are
effectively weakened by the provision. According to him, the section implies
that violations of INEC guidelines alone may not be sufficient grounds to
question election outcomes – a situation he described as one of the long-standing
“rigging provisions” that had been resisted in the past.
My friend and brother, Yemi Adebowale, a former Editor at This Day
Newspaper, has also had cause to examine critically, the 2026 Electoral Act and
has identified Section 77 (2) of the Law as another bizarre one that was
deliberately inserted to deal with opposition political parties. That aspect of the
law mandates political parties to submit a comprehensive digital membership
register to INEC at least 21 days before their primaries.
Indeed, Section 77 (2) of the Electoral Act 2026 states that membership
registers to be submitted must contain the name, sex, date of birth, address,
state, local government, ward, polling unit, national identity number, and
photograph of members. Section 77 (5) added: “Only members whose names
are contained in the register shall be eligible to vote and be voted for in party
primaries, congresses, and conventions of the political parties.” This also means
that once your name is not in the register submitted to INEC, you cannot be
nominated for any position in the general election.
According to section 77(7), a party that fails to submit the membership register
within the stipulated time “shall not be eligible to field candidates” in all
elections to be conducted by INEC. The game plan became clearer when INEC
recently unveiled its revised timetable for the 2027 general election and directed
political parties to comply with section 77(2) of the law by submitting their
membership registers by April 21. This was later extended to May 10, a clear
eight months before the general election.
Those who packaged this Section 77 of the Electoral Act 2026 clearly had an
agenda. They openly say that it is to make last-minute defections between
political parties more difficult. While this may be correct, it may also be
targeted at the former Presidential Candidate of the Labour Party, Mr. Peter Obi,
who recently dumped the Labour Party after the protracted leadership tussle that
polarised the party following the 2023 general elections. While there is the
Lamidi Apapa faction of the party, another faction is led by Julius Abure, while
the Senator Nenadi Usman faction is now the faction recognised by law and the
INEC.
Despite several setbacks in court, the Abure-led faction has not yet given up,
and has directed his lawyers to file the necessary papers at the Supreme Court.
Nenadi Usman, who spoke last week, also alluded to Section 77 of the Electoral
Act when she stated that Obi may not be able to contest the 2027 presidential
election under the banner of the party even if he is willing, as there is no
certainty that he would pick the presidential ticket of the ADC coalition.
Why must political parties submit names of their members to INEC? The
global standard is for political parties to maintain their membership registers.
They can continue to admit new members until the date for the submission of
nominated candidates set by the umpire. The umpire focuses on the register of
voters; updating and revalidating it. With this Section 77 (2) of the Electoral Act
2026, political parties must stop admitting members nine clear months before
the 2027 general election. Once the membership register is submitted on May
10, 2026, as directed by INEC, the political parties can’t take new members
until after the 2027 general election.
With the way things stand, political parties battling internal crisis may not meet
INEC’s May 10 deadline for submission of membership register. The law states
that any party that fails to submit its membership register within the stipulated
time will not be allowed to field candidates for that election. It simply means
that the main opposition party, ADC, may not field candidates in the 2027
general election as the party’s case is still at the Supreme Court. It is the same
scenario with the PDP, and with the Abure-led faction of the Labour Party also
heading in the same direction.
I am still at a loss as to how Section 77 of the Electoral Act 2026 eluded many
of the opposition figures while the draft was still at the National Assembly.
They could not detect the danger in it then. They were busy demanding for real
time transmission of election results.
For decades, Nigeria’s elections have been marred by allegations of
manipulation during the collation of results. While voting often proceeds
peacefully at most polling units, disputes usually arise later, when results are
moved from one collation centre to another. To address this, INEC introduced
technological tools such as the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS),
and the INEC result-viewing portal (IReV) ahead of the 2023 elections. The
goal was to ensure that once the results are counted and signed at polling units,
they should be uploaded online for everyone to see. This would reduce human
interference, improve transparency, and allow citizens to verify results
independently, no matter their location. However, because these tools were not
clearly entrenched in law, their use remained discretionary. That legal lacuna
became a major problem in 2023. Although, the opposition political parties
succeeded in ensuring that it was included in the 2026 Electoral Act, the
lawmakers also succeeded in adding another proviso into the Act – manual
transmission, in case real-time transmission was not possible.
While there are several provisions in the 2026 Electoral Act that should be
commended, the several ‘landmines’ identified above may skew the election in
favour of the ruling APC. But the blame for that rest squarely with the
opposition political parties, whose members at the National Assembly failed
them by lack of due diligence, and they should bear the brunt of their own short-
sightedness. Perhaps, they should start preparing for the 2031 general elections,
as that of 2027 seems to have been won and lost already.
