It is indeed bewildering, to say the least, that some segment of Nigerians can still fall for the shenanigans, balderdash and outright falsehood coming from the so-called higher legislative chambers of the National Assembly, the Senate, concerning the upcoming general elections and Electoral Act reforms.
It has to be said that the members of the House of Representatives have shown more understanding and appreciation of the situation and are in tune with the aspirations of the people concerning the proposed 2026 Electoral Act Amendment Bill.
Is it not shameful or disgraceful that these Senators think so lowly of the people to want to think that they can pull this wool off the eyes of the electorate again?
How do any serious people desirous to improve upon a process stick to the same excuses of four years ago, with no intention to improve upon the previous experience?
In 2023, members of the 9th National Assembly told us that because of poor Internet penetration in some areas, they cannot successfully guarantee real-time electronic transmission of results, even when the then INEC Chairman, Yakubu Mahmood, kept reassuring us to the contrary.
Four years later, the same talk of poor Internet connectivity is still being bandied as the reason it still cannot work.
One thing for sure is that the slight adjustment of Section 60 (3) of the 2023 Electoral Act as envisioned by the people in the proposed 2026 Amendment, by the Senate, is only a half measure, and still unacceptable. If the Senate leadership is pretending not to understand the real issues, then they should, at least, simply kowtow and align themselves with the position of the House of Representatives.
It’s unambiguous and clear as to what the people are asking for. To do otherwise is to kick the can further down the road. It simply means we are shifting the doom’s day forward. To yield to the position of the Senate simply means that in 2031, we will still be confronted with the same issues we faced in 2023 and are about to face in 2027.
Let’s not be deceived into thinking that the senators do not understand what the real issues are. All these deflections and diversions from the substance are only attempts to test the resolve of the people, and this is not the time to lower our guard.
Or what will anyone make out of the case of the Senate supposedly clarifying that the real-time electronic transmission of election results does not amount to electronic voting and dismissing claims that it had rejected the use of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Result Viewing Portal (IReV) for the 2027 general elections.
Was there really any confusion to warrant the intervention of the Chairman of the Senate Ad-hoc Panel on the Review of the 2026 Electoral Bill, Senator Adeniyi Adegbonmire, about so-called growing public debate over the distinction between result transmission and e-voting.
This is diversionary. In fact, by now, our discussions should actually have been on electronic voting, but because our mischievous political class wants us stick to the past, that is why we are still discussing the mode of transmission of election results.
The agitation now, is compulsory, real-time electronic transmission of results from the polling booths and not e-voting. There is nothing confusing or ambiguous about the two.
Last Tuesday’s little shift in position by the Senate only amounts to taking a leap and landing almost at the point of takeoff. No real progress was made.
What the Senate succeeded in doing is shifting the discretion of deciding the mode of transmission from the INEC to the polling unit staff. What that implies is that whereas INEC 2023 could before, during and after decide the mode of transmission, the INEC official at the polling unit now is to decide how the results can be transmitted in the event that there is no network or should there be a glitch.
As things stand now, what it then means is that come election day, there will be lots of issues around transmission to warrant these INEC officials deciding to transmit or transfer election results manually. That’s where the issue really is. Giving that room for manipulation is the crux of the matter.
The Senate pretends to care about disenfranchising voters in the event that there are failures in transmitting real-time but the truth is that the population of those who will stay away from the polls because of a lack of faith in the process would by far be more.
One of the reasons why there was an increase in registered voters in the 2023 election, was because of the false hopes raised by Yakubu Mahmood around real-time transmission of results from the polling booths. Does it not also bother the senators that this same demographic, especially the young ones, would stay away from the polls? Or is that ultimately the game plan? What happens to the ever-increasing cases of voter apathy by those who lack faith in the current process and have continued to stay away?
Both the senators and members of the House are representatives of the people, so why is it that while the Senators pretend to bother about system failure, the House of Representatives has no problem with it? Are the electorate different, or do they live in different societies?
There’s no foolproof system in human activities. There will always be a margin for errors, but that should not be a reason to deliberately create lacuna for errors, fraud or a reason to refuse to deepen the adoption of technology as the senators want us to do.
Perhaps it can also be argued that considering occasional hiccups in the financial sector through fintech, we should have remained with the old order of going to queue in the banks.
It’s a shame that these senators still want our elections decided by the courts and all the shenanigans that go with it.
They are scared that they will not win any transparent, free, and fair election.
We are tired of endless disputes after every election. We’re tired of people being maimed and killed in the name of elections. We are tired of the worst of us representing the best of us.
The only way to go now is to improve the system by adopting more technology. The margin of errors and cost is by far less than doing otherwise.
When the card readers were first introduced, the argument then was that it was going to disenfranchise some voters. Today, we are better for it. What is the use of acquiring technology and not putting them into full use?
As the harmonisation committee of both chambers meet, let us all remain vigilant and insist only on real-time transmission alone. Only then can we really prevent the intended fraud of the senators. A Senate that initially was against real-time electronic transmission, leaving the decision for INEC to decide, as was the case in 2023, certainly does not mean well.
So eternal vigilance remains the price to pay if we want to be taken seriously in the comity of nations. We cannot allow a bunch of electoral bandits and society never-do-wells to be representing us as leaders.
We are not asking for much. What we ask is to let our votes count. Let the choice of the people remain sacrosanct. That way, we can hold our leaders accountable.
It is disgraceful that the senators are making excuses for INEC. That should not be their responsibility because they are concerned parties. Only INEC should be allowed to organise elections and how best they can do that. The electoral body has done this in several off cycle elections without hitches in some states.
Incidentally, this real-time transmission of results was used to vote these dubious senators in 2023. What are they now afraid of?
As we await the recommendation of the Harmonisation Committee, let it be understood loud and clear; there is nothing ambiguous about it: it is either compulsory real-time transmission or nothing.
