A coalition of civil society organisations has asked the National Assembly’s conference committee to adopt the House of Representatives’ position mandating real-time electronic transmission of election results, warning that the Senate’s revised clause could weaken safeguards against electoral manipulation ahead of the 2027 elections.
The groups, Centre for Media and Society, Kukah Centre, International Press Centre, ElectHER, Nigerian Women Trust Fund, TAF Africa and Yiaga Africa, made the demand in a joint statement on Tuesday.
Their position follows the Senate’s earlier rejection of compulsory real-time transmission during consideration of the Electoral Act (Amendment) Bill, 2026, before it partially reversed itself at an emergency plenary and adopted a softer provision allowing electronic transmission only “where possible.”
While welcoming the reversal in a joint statement issued on Tuesday, the group said the Senate’s conditional language introduces “dangerous ambiguity” that could be exploited to bypass electronic uploads from polling units during elections in the country.
“The undersigned civil society organisation advancing electoral integrity, welcomes the Senate’s decision to rescind its earlier rejection of mandatory electronic transmission of election results from polling units. However, we express serious concerns about the following insertions in Clause 60(3).
“The conditional language ‘provided if it fails and it becomes impossible to transmit’ introduces troubling discretion in the results management process.
“The bill does not define what constitutes failure, how such failure is to be documented, or what verification mechanisms must apply. In the absence of clear safeguards, this clause risks creating a loophole that could undermine the very purpose of electronic transmission,” it said.
The CSOs warned that leaving the process to the discretion of election officials may weaken transparency and erode public trust in the Independent National Electoral Commission.
The coalition also faulted the designation of Form EC8A as the “primary source” of election results, arguing that giving precedence to manual forms over electronically transmitted copies diminished the legal weight of digital records meant to serve as an independent audit trail.
According to the groups, prolonged disagreements between the chambers have already created legal uncertainty that could slow INEC’s preparations and undermine credible elections.
They urged the harmonisation committee to adopt the House’s version, mandating the real-time transmission of results, including accredited voter figures, directly to a public portal, and to ensure the electronic record is used to verify any manually collated outcome.
The coalition also called for approval of downloadable lists of missing and unissued voter cards to prevent disenfranchisement and demanded that civil society and technical experts be allowed to participate meaningfully in the committee’s deliberations.
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