•Nigerian Senate
The Senate today panicked over public backlash from its insistence to retain electronic transmission of election results, in place of the proposed real time electronic transmission of election results.
As a result it hurriedly deployed thirteen Senators to the Press Centre of the Senate in defense of the Senate President, Senator Godswill Akpabio and the red chamber over yesterday’s deliberation that reportedly disappointed majority of Nigerians, reports Daily Independent.
Yesterday they dropped the proposed provisions of section 60 (3) of the 2026 Electoral bill that would have allowed for active monitoring of voting patterns during elections.
The provision states : ” The Presiding Officer shall electronically transmit the results from each polling unit to IREV portal in real time 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 available at the polling unit ”
The President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, had during consideration of the bill clause by clause on Wednesday, announced that clause 60 as amended and not as recommended, which made the media to widely report that the new provision was rejected.
But 24 hours after, thirteen serving senators across political divides led by Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe (Abia South) hurriedly briefed journalists covering the Senate for clarification.
Senator Abaribe at the briefing said the thirteen Senators came out to correct the wrong impression created by media reports on the position of the Senate on electronic transmission of results as contained in section 60( 3 ) of the 2026 electoral bill.
He pointedly declared that the Senate did not reject electronic transmission of results as according to him, the thirteen Senators and many others across political divides will monitor the very important provision to the point of transmission for presidential assent.
“To put the record straight, yesterday (Wednesday), the Senate did not, I repeat, did not pass transfer of results which was in the 2022 Act.
“What we passed and which the Senate President himself said when he was doing a clarification, sitting on his chair, is electronic transmission of results”, he said.
He added that the Senators organised the briefing to set the record straight and assure Nigerians that the provision shall be monitored by them to the point of transmission for presidential assent.
“I can assure you on my own, and on all of us who are standing here, that both the Electoral Committee of the Senate and the Ad Hoc Committee of the Senate, and also in the Executive Session that we all agreed on Section 60 ( 3) which is electronic electronic transmission of votes, or electronic transmission of results” he stressed.
Making further clarification at the briefing, Senator Abdul Ningi ( Bauchi Central ), the report that the Senate rejected electronic transmission of results as very painful.
“Our coming here today is to assure Nigerians that the Senate at no time since September last year when the whole process for new electoral Act for the 2027 general election started, jettisoned the need for legal provision for electronic transmission of election result by INEC .
“This negative trajectory against the Senate and by extension the National Assembly , should stop . We shall ensure that section 60( 3) of the 2026 Electoral Bill , follows what will be transmitted to the President for assent “, he said .
Aside Abaribe and Ningi , other Senators present at the briefing include, Austin Akobundu (PDP – Abia Central) Peter Jiya (PDP – Niger South), Ireti Kingibe (ADC – FCT), Victor Umeh (LP – Anambra Central), Binos Yaroe (PDP – Adamawa South), Kabeeb Mustapha (PDP Jigawa South West, Khalid Mustapha ( PDP Kaduna North), Mohammed Ogoshi Onawo (APC – Nasarawa South), Aminu Waziri Tambuwal (PDP – Sokoto South), Tony Nwoye (LP – Anambra North) and Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan (PDP – Kogi Central).
