Iyobosa Uwugiaren argues that while the Senate has accepted electronic transmission of results into Nigeria’s electoral design, it is only a guest, not as a rule.
After weeks of public outrage and sustained civic pressure, the Senate has retreated—though only partially—from its earlier rejection of electronic transmission of election results. On Tuesday, senators amended the Electoral Act to permit the electronic transmission of results from polling units to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) Result Viewing Portal (IREV). Yet the concession came with substantial conditions well short of the sweeping reform many Nigerians had demanded.
Electronic transmission, though now admitted into Nigeria’s electoral framework, enters not as a rule but as a guest—welcome, but closely supervised.