Moses Ofodeme
The Movement For Credible Elections (MCE) expresses serious concern over the Senate’s amendment to Section 60(3) of the Electoral Act 2022, which, while mandating electronic transmission of results to the IReV portal, permits a fallback to manual collation where electronic transmission is claimed to have failed due to network issues.
This amendment falls short of the clear and overwhelming demand of Nigerians for only mandatory electronic transmission of results. By allowing manual result sheets (Form EC8A) to become the primary source of collation on account of alleged network failure, the Senate has inadvertently reopened the door to electoral manipulation.
In the Nigerian context, this proviso is dangerous. Claims of “ *network failure* ” are easy to make, difficult to verify in real time, and have historically been used to justify result substitution and other irregularities.The “technical glitch” called by INEC in 2023 is still too fresh and a wound to be forgotten.
Manual collation remains the most compromised stage of the electoral process and it’s the very problem electronic transmission was designed to eliminate. It is important therefore to clarify that real-time transmission challenges are not BVAS system failures but network relativity issues. BVAS operates on secure cloud-computing protocols, meaning results captured and queued for transmission remain preserved and should not be invalidated by temporary connectivity challenges.
Allowing manual collation to override electronically captured results effectively entrenches the status quo and undermines public confidence in electoral reforms. Nigerians did not ask for conditional electronic transmission; they demanded a system that decisively blocks manipulation.
We therefore reject the amendment as currently framed and call for a review that ensures electronic transmission remains mandatory, decisive, and superior to manual processes in all circumstances.