2027: Trust me, I won’t fail you, INEC chair assures Nigerians

By Omeiza Ajayi Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC, Prof. Joash Amupitan SAN, has asked Nigerians to trust him to deliver a free, fair, credible and inclusive election next year, promising to not fail them This was as he said the commission is yet to recover from the trust deficit created by the technical glitches associated with the 2023 general election, and vowed that inaccurate polling unit results will not reach the INEC Result Viewing Portal IReV in 2027.

Amupitan spoke on Thursday at Chatham House, London, at a dialogue held with the Kimpact Development Initiative (KDI) on the theme, “Nigeria’s 2027 Elections: Democratic Trajectory and Regional Stability Beyond the Ballot.” His Chief Press Secretary, Adedayo Oketola, said the INEC chairman noted that the controversies over the 2023 presidential election badly dented public confidence in the commission.

“First, let me speak about what happened in 2023, which resulted in a significant trust deficit for INEC—damage so large that the Commission has not yet fully recovered from it,” he said. He said the commission’s audit after 2023 traced the worst result management failures to collation centres, not polling units. “In 2023, there were instances of inaccurate results or results with over-voting being uploaded onto IReV.

We have now devised a technical safeguard: if a result is not accurate at the polling unit, it will not go to IReV at all. The moment a result appears on IReV, citizens can trust what they see. By eliminating inconsistencies at the source, collation will become a transparent formality”, he stated. The INEC chairman announced that the commission would hold a nationwide mock accreditation and voting exercise on November 28, 2026.

“On the 28th of this month, we will conduct a mock accreditation and voting exercise across all states of the federation to simulate the presidential election and verify that we have gotten both accreditation and electronic result transmission right,” he said. Asked why Nigerians should trust his leadership, Amupitan who assumed office in October 2025, pointed to the off-cycle elections he had conducted.

“Why must Nigerians trust me? Nigerians must trust me because, number one, I have conducted off-cycle elections—and observers agree that the recent election in Osun State marked a clear improvement,” he said. He listed the Anambra and Osun governorship elections, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Area Council polls, the Ekiti governorship election and 16 legislative by-elections.

Amupitan recalled that the 2021 Anambra governorship poll took roughly five days to conclude, whereas results in Anambra and Osun were declared the day after voting under his watch. “Every election is a lesson. The 2023 general election was a major lesson for Nigeria, and the Anambra election was another,” he said. He said INEC considered introducing a new electoral technology for 2027 but chose to upgrade its existing infrastructure because of the tight timeline before the polls.

To address the malfunctions of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) linked to heat and storage conditions in 2023, he said INEC was building climate-controlled storage facilities in all states. The commission has also bought extra devices and cut the maximum number of voters assigned per BVAS from 1,250 to 850, so that polling units with more than 850 registered voters will get multiple devices.

On funding, Amupitan said INEC had received a substantial part of its 2027 election budget and had been assured that the outstanding balance, part of which is meant for the recruitment and welfare of ad hoc staff, would be released before the end of November. Responding to allegations on social media that linked his phone number to a controversial X account, he denied ever operating one.

He said an independent forensic review had been obtained and the matter referred to the Department of State Services (DSS) and the Inspector-General of Police for investigation. He dismissed suggestions that his past legal representation in political disputes would affect his impartiality. “My loyalty is solely to the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Electoral Act,” he said.

On claims of an 85 per cent surge in registrants in a ward in Ebonyi State, he said the commission had investigated and resolved the complaint in line with statutory procedures. The Presidential and National Assembly elections hold on January 16, 2027, while the Governorship and State Houses of Assembly elections follow on February 6, 2027. Amupitan urged young Nigerians to stay involved in the democratic process.

“Misinformation remains one of the greatest threats to our democracy. Citizens must verify information before acting or sharing, and give our democracy the chance to succeed,” he said.