2027: INEC receives over 4,800 claims, 600 objections on voter register

By Omeiza Ajayi The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has received over 4,800 claims and about 600 objections on the preliminary voter register, with a promise that the discrepancies will be corrected before the final register is certified on December 15, 2026. INEC Chairman, Professor Joash Amupitan SAN, disclosed this on Friday when the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Pre-Election Fact-Finding Mission paid a courtesy visit to the commission’s headquarters in Abuja.

The mission is led by Victor Bockarie Foh, a former Vice-President of Sierra Leone. Amupitan said the claims, received at the registration areas where the register was displayed as of Thursday, were mainly corrections and other minor matters. On objections, he said the commission had received “about 600 complaints on the register” through electoral officers and Resident Electoral Commissioners from the various wards.

He added that “the display of the register online is also confirming some of the complaints we had earlier received.” According to hum, the register now stands at over 103 million registered citizens, adding that it is a huge figure, and that the discrepancies noticed would be corrected so that “the register will be properly cleaned up” ahead of the final list.

The commission completed three phases of the Continuous Voter Registration exercise and recently ended the physical display of the preliminary register at registration areas nationwide. It has also published the register on its online portal, display.inecnigeria.org, “for public scrutiny, claims, and objections.” He again restated that the Presidential and National Assembly elections will hold on Saturday, January 16, 2027, while the Governorship and State Houses of Assembly elections are scheduled for Saturday, February 6, 2027.

He said the commission will deploy personnel and technology across 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, covering 774 Local Government Areas, 8,809 Registration Areas (Wards) and 176,846 polling units. Amupitan said the commission had executed nine of the 14 major milestones in its Revised Timetable and Schedule of Activities for the election.

He said INEC had also moved “away from administrative assumptions” by personally conducting zonal readiness assessment tours. It has covered the South-West in Lagos, the North-West in Kaduna, the South-East in Enugu and the North-East in Gombe, and the team is heading to Port Harcourt for the South-South. The North-Central, the last zone, will be visited next week.

He said the tours had shown that some areas needed higher deployments than planned because of terrain and security challenges. Amupitan disclosed that the commission is planning a mock accreditation across the country, which he said should hold “some time in November.” He said it would test accreditation and the transmission of results simultaneously in all the states, to be sure the commission can “cure the problem of glitch that took place in 2023.” On technology, he said the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) will be deployed for dual biometric accreditation, by fingerprint and face.

The commission has also introduced a new electronic verification platform, eEC8A, for results transmitted to the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV). He said a safeguard has been introduced so that results are authenticated at the polling unit before they go to the portal. He explained that discrepancies had emerged in the past as results moved from the polling unit to higher levels of collation.

On staff welfare, Amupitan said the commission had secured approval for the Consolidated Election Management Body Salary Structure, which takes its workforce out of the regular civil service scale. It also secured a 150 per cent increase in state operational overheads. In return, he said, the commission maintains “zero tolerance for administrative negligence, extortion, or partisan compromise.” That policy is backed by Oaths of Neutrality under Section 26 of the Electoral Act 2026.

On security, he said the commission is working with the Nigeria Police Force, the Department of State Services, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps and the Armed Forces through the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES). The framework uses early risk-mapping tools to secure polling units, protect ad-hoc staff, particularly members of the National Youth Service Corps, and guarantee access for all voters, including persons with disabilities.

He said the commission is also finalising plans for internally displaced persons, “to ensure inclusivity.” Amupitan, who said he has been in office for one year, having been sworn in on October 23 last year, said the commission had conducted four main off-cycle elections and 16 by-elections in that period. He said these gave INEC the chance to test its plans and equipment.

“The mistakes of the past cannot be allowed to repeat themselves,” he said. He told the ECOWAS delegation the c