Protest Looms as Senate Approves E-Transmission with Manual Collation Option

During an emergency plenary on Tuesday, the Senate revisited a disputed clause in the Electoral Act Amendment Bill and approved the electronic transmission of election results to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s Result Viewing (IReV) portal. At the same time, senators allowed manual collation to remain as a fallback in case of technical failures.

While electronic transmission is now permitted, the Senate declined to make it mandatory and rejected the proposal for real-time uploads of results. According to the revised provision, presiding officers are expected to transmit results electronically to the IReV portal after completing voting and documentation. In situations where technology fails due to network or communication issues, the manual result sheet, Form EC8A, will serve as the official record for collation and announcement.

Senate President Godswill Akpabio put the motion to a voice vote, urging any senator who opposed the amendment to formally submit a counter-motion.

“It’s very simple. If you disagree, move your counter motion. If you agree with him, then you agree with me when I put the votes,” Akpabio said.

He explained that the motion before the chamber sought to reverse an earlier Senate decision on Section 60, Subsection 3 of the Electoral Act.

Reading the amended clause, Akpabio said, “That the presiding officer shall electronically transmit the results from each polling unit to the IReV portal. And such transmission shall be done after the prescribed Form EC8A has been signed and stamped by the presiding officer and/or countersigned by the candidates or polling agents, where available at the polling units, because sometimes you don’t see any polling agent.”

The Senate President added that the law now accounts for situations where electronic transmission is impossible.

“Provided that if the electronic transmission of the results fails as a result of communication failure — in other words, maybe network or otherwise — and it becomes impossible to transmit the results electronically in Form EC8A signed and stamped by the presiding officer and/or countersigned by the candidates or polling agents where available at the polling units, the Form EC8A shall in such a case be the primary source of collation and declaration of results,” he said.

The amendment has sparked concerns among civil society organisations and opposition figures, who argue that allowing manual results to override electronically transmitted ones could weaken transparency and create room for manipulation, especially in areas with poor network coverage.