The Senate has passed the Electoral Act Amendment Bill 2026 but declined to make electronic transmission of election results mandatory for the 2027 polls.
Lawmakers rejected a proposed change to Clause 60 (3), which would have required presiding officers of the Independent National Electoral Commission to transmit polling unit results to the IReV portal in real time after completing Form EC8A. Instead, they retained the existing 2022 provision that results should be transferred “in a manner as prescribed by the Commission.”
Senate President Godswill Akpabio insisted the chamber did not remove electronic transmission from the law. He said the Senate only chose to keep the wording already in the 2022 Act, which INEC used in the last general elections.
The Senate also rejected a proposal to increase the penalty for buying or selling Permanent Voter Cards from two years to 10 years in prison. It kept the two year jail term but raised the fine from N2 million to N5 million.
Under Clause 28, the notice of election period was cut from at least 360 days before the poll to 180 days. Clause 29 was amended to reduce the deadline for political parties to submit their list of candidates and affidavits from 180 days to 90 days before a general election.
Lawmakers retained the provision on ballot paper format, which requires INEC to invite parties at least 20 days before an election to inspect how their identity appears on sample materials and respond within two days.
The Senate confirmed the replacement of smart card readers with the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System for accreditation and voting under Clause 47. However, it rejected electronically generated voter identification and kept the Permanent Voter’s Card as the means of identifying voters at polling units.
Clause 142 on the effect of non compliance, which would have allowed petitioners to rely only on documents that clearly show irregularities without calling oral evidence, was deleted after senators argued it could waste court time.
The bill will now go to a conference committee where the Senate and House of Representatives will harmonise their versions before sending the final document to President Bola Tinubu for assent.
Outside the chamber, opposition figures and parties criticised the decision not to mandate real time electronic transmission. Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar called it a blow to transparency, saying real time uploads help curb manipulation and protect voters’ choices.
The Labour Party described the move as a betrayal of Nigerians, arguing that electronic transmission from polling units to INEC servers is key to preventing result tampering. APGA founder Chekwas Okorie and PDP chieftain Bode George also condemned the step, warning it could undermine confidence in the 2027 elections.
In a separate briefing, INEC Chairman Prof Joash Amupitan said the commission has already finalised the timetable and schedule of activities for the 2027 general elections in line with the constitution and current law. He urged the National Assembly to speed up work on the amendments and announced plans for a nationwide voter register clean up and revalidation exercise.
Amupitan said BVAS devices are being configured for the February 21, 2026 FCT Area Council elections, with mock accreditation set for February 7 in 289 polling units. He also highlighted upcoming bye elections in Rivers and Kano, and governorship polls in Ekiti and Osun in 2026, while calling on the media and civil society to help tackle voter apathy, hate speech and misinformation.
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