The Nigerian Senate has vigorously defended its decision to make the electronic transmission of election results discretionary rather than mandatory in the newly amended Electoral Act 2026. A statement issued on Sunday highlights that the move was necessitated by "empirical data" regarding the country’s significant infrastructure deficits in the telecommunications and power sectors.
The upper chamber’s clarification follows a period of intense legislative friction and public demonstrations. While the House of Representatives had pushed for a version of the bill requiring "real-time" electronic uploads, the Senate opted for a hybrid framework. Under the approved Clause 60(3), presiding officers are encouraged to transmit results to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV), but the physical Form EC8A remains the legally binding primary source for collation in the event of technology failure.
Senate Leader Opeyemi Bamidele, speaking through a statement from his media directorate, argued that a mandatory "real-time" requirement could lead to a constitutional crisis. He emphasised that the legislature could not fulfil its obligations to the detriment of the citizenry by enacting laws based purely on "public emotion or sentiment".
“The data speak directly to the stark realities of our federation,” Bamidele stated. “If our law does not capture the realities of the federation, then it is a script for anarchy or a ploy for instability.”
To support this stance, the Senate cited figures from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) indicating that Nigeria had only reached approximately 70% broadband coverage by 2025. Furthermore, data from the Speedtest Global Index was highlighted, which ranked Nigeria 85th out of 105 nations in mobile network reliability. Lawmakers argued that these gaps, combined with the fact that 43% of the population still lacks access to the national electricity grid, make a strictly digital mandate impractical.
The decision has met with fierce resistance from opposition figures and civil society organisations. Former presidential candidate Peter Obi and former Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi joined protesters at the National Assembly last week, demanding a return to mandatory electronic transmission to ensure transparency and curb manual manipulation.
Senate President Godswill Akpabio, who presided over the emergency sessions leading to the final vote, maintained that the "fallback mechanism" is a resilient safeguard. He noted that the Senate’s version provides legal backing to the IReV portal—addressing a major legal gap identified during the 2023 election litigations—while acknowledging the technical limitations on the ground.
A 12-member conference committee has now been constituted to harmonise the Senate’s discretionary approach with the House of Representatives' more rigid digital requirements. The final version of the 2026 Electoral Act is expected to be transmitted to President Bola Tinubu for assent before the end of the first quarter.