Nigeria’s Senate has bowed to intense public pressure, approving the electronic transmission of election results to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s Result Viewing Portal (IReV), after days of protests and national outrage over a disputed amendment widely seen as a threat to electoral transparency.
The decision, taken during an emergency plenary on Tuesday, followed a hurried reconsideration of Clause 60(3) of the Electoral Act (Repeal and Re-enactment) Amendment Bill, 2026, which had triggered condemnation from opposition leaders, civil society organisations and youth groups accusing lawmakers of attempting to weaken safeguards ahead of the 2027 general elections.
But the Senate stopped short of making electronic transmission compulsory. It rejected demands for the explicit inclusion of real-time upload of results, a key point pushed by protesters who warned that any loophole could reopen the door to manipulation.
Under the revised provision, presiding officers are required to transmit polling unit results electronically to the IReV portal after voting has concluded and documentation has been completed. However, the Senate inserted a caveat: where electronic transmission fails due to communication or network challenges, the manually completed result sheet, Form EC8A, becomes the primary basis for collation and declaration.
As he put the amendment to a voice vote, Senate President Godswill Akpabio urged dissenting senators to challenge it formally on the floor.
“It’s very simple. If you disagree with him, move your counter motion,” Akpabio said, warning that the chamber’s rules provided clear procedure for contesting decisions.
Reading the amended clause, he declared: “That the presiding officer shall electronically transmit the results from each polling unit to the IReV portal.”
He added that transmission must take place only after Form EC8A had been signed and stamped by the presiding officer and countersigned by candidates or polling agents where available.
The Senate president also spelt out the fallback provision, saying manual collation would apply where electronic transmission becomes impossible due to network failures.
“Provided that if the electronic transmission of the results fails as a result of communication failure … the Form EC8A shall in such a case be the primary source of collation and declaration of results,” Akpabio said.
Despite the Senate’s attempt to frame the decision as a compromise, opposition parties and civil society groups have continued to express concern, warning that allowing manual results to override electronically transmitted ones could weaken transparency, especially in areas with poor network coverage.
The emergency sitting itself was marked by disorder. The Senate chief whip, Tahir Monguno, moved a motion seeking to rescind the chamber’s earlier approval of the controversial clause, relying on provisions of the Senate Standing Orders. The motion, seconded by Abdul Ningi, quickly plunged the chamber into tension, with lawmakers shouting across aisles and raising competing points of order.
The dispute intensified when Monguno read a revised version of Clause 60(3) without the phrase “real-time” and replaced the word “transmission” with “transfer”, prompting fierce objections from Enyinnaya Abaribe, who repeatedly demanded procedural intervention and at one point invoked Order 72 to call for a formal division.
As pressure mounted inside and outside the chamber, the Senate also announced a 12-member conference committee to harmonise differences between its version of the bill and that passed by the House of Representatives.
Akpabio said the committee, chaired by Simon Lalong, had been expanded from nine to 12 members to reflect the urgency of the matter. Other members include Orji Uzor Kalu, Monguno, Adamu Aliero, Abba Moro, Asuquo Ekpenyong, Aminu Iya Abbas, Tokunbo Abiru, Niyi Adegbonmire, Jibrin Isah, Ipalibo Banigo and Onyekachi Nwebonyi.
“If you are able to conclude within the next few days or one week, the President should be able to sign the amended Electoral Bill into law within the month of February,” Akpabio said.
Orji Uzor Kalu later defended the Senate’s decision as “balanced”, insisting it would strengthen credibility while ensuring voters in communities with weak networks were not disenfranchised.
“This means electronic transmission becomes the primary method where the technology is available and functional,” he said, adding that Form EC8A would remain valid where transmission fails.
But Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan publicly dissented, arguing that real-time transmission remained central to restoring trust in Nigeria’s elections.
“Real-time electronic transmission of election results is a critical step toward deepening transparency,” she wrote, insisting that Nigerians deserved elections that reflected “the genuine will of the people”.
Outside the National Assembly, protests intensified under the banner Occupy the National Assembly, with demonstrators accusing lawmakers of watering down reforms.
Former vice-president Atiku Abubakar criticised the Senate’s approach, warning that the mixture of manual and electronic systems could create confusion.
“What we got is a mixture of electronic and manual transmission, which is going to cause more confusion or chaos,” he said, urging opposition parties to unite against the provision.
Former Rivers governor Rotimi Amaechi, who joined protesters in Abuja, argued that real-time transmission could reduce election-related violence.
“The advantage is that very few people will die on the election field,” he told the crowd, describing the reform as a life-saving measure.
Nasir el-Rufai, the former Kaduna governor, said he would have joined the protests if he had been in the country, accusing the Senate of resisting reforms for political survival. Activist Omoyele Sowore also joined demonstrators, insisting Nigeria’s political class could not reform itself and calling for sustained mass action.
The Peoples Democratic Party described the manual fallback clause as a “backdoor move” that could weaken electoral reforms, warning that the Senate’s decision fell short of public expectations and could undermine confidence ahead of 2027.
