Opposition political parties have said Nigeria is being pushed to the precipice by the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led Federal Government.
The parties, the African Democratic Congress (ADC), the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) at a joint press conference in Abuja on Thursday, described the new Electoral Act signed into law by President Bola Tinubu as anti-democratic, warning that its implementation will undermine electoral transparency and the sanctity of the ballot.
Dr. Ajuji Ahmed, NNPP National Chairman, who read the text of the press conference, said several provisions of the Electoral Act, 2026, signed into law by President Tinubu, are offensive and part of a plot by the APC administration to subvert the will of the people in the 2027 general elections.
“This obnoxious Electoral Act, 2026 is without doubt enacted to undermine democracy in Nigeria, and it is part of the ongoing design by the Tinubu-led APC to disorganize and weaken the opposition, corrupt the electoral system, compromise democratic institutions, and foist a totalitarian one-party rule on Nigeria.
“Therefore, we, as patriotic leaders standing shoulder to shoulder with Nigerians, reject the new Electoral Act for the following reasons,” the parties stated.
Dr. Ahmed stated that the introduction of the proviso in Section 60(3), which allows wide and undefined discretionary powers to the presiding officer to override and negate the purpose of introducing electronic transmission of election results from polling units, is intended to provide a blank cheque to those who seek to manipulate election results by delaying the electronic transmission of results to the INEC Results Review (IREV) portal on the pretext of network failure.
“The premise of the proviso in Section 60(3) is the unavailability or possibility of network failure. We find this premise dubious and inconsistent with reality,” he added.
The opposition parties recalled that the immediate past Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Chairman, Prof. Mahmud Yakubu, stated that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) equipment, which operates offline, had worked with over 90 percent success rate across the nation, and in the event of network failure at the point of transmission, the results would be delivered successfully whenever network became available.
“This position has been further confirmed most recently by the former INEC Commissioner, Festus Okoye, as widely reported, that every polling unit in Nigeria has internet access. Indeed, these statements by those who have been in a position to know provide a counterfactual to the lies being fed to the Nigerian people by a government that has lost respect for reason and reality.
“The testimonies of these two principal officers of INEC have also been strongly supported by publicly available data,” the parties said.
They noted that the Nigerian Communications Commission, as of 2023, reported more than 95 percent 2G coverage, which is more than sufficient for the transmission of election results from polling units.
The parties said Nigeria already had more than 159 million internet subscribers, and over 220 million telephone subscribers using 2G networks.
According to them, denying mandatory real-time transmission of election results from polling units on the basis of lack of communication network is not supported by evidence.
They noted that millions of Nigerians transact business daily on various financial platforms even from the remotest parts of the country, and said the “no-network” argument is fraudulent and merely part of the APC’s plan to rig the 2027 elections.
“Indeed, we find it quite ironic that the same APC that strongly agitated for electronic voting only a few years ago is now opposed to the use of technology for mere transmission of results. The game at hand is very clear.”
The parties also opposed Section 84 of the Electoral Act, which limits political parties to direct primaries and consensus for candidate selection, stating it is an overreach on the constitutionally guaranteed autonomy of political parties.
They said the National Assembly cannot hide under Section 228(b) of the Constitution to restrict political parties to only two methods of nomination.
“There is nothing undemocratic about indirect primaries, which create an electoral college for the selection of candidates in an objective, transparent, and orderly manner,” the parties said.
They described indirect primaries as the most democratic of the three methods provided in all past Electoral Acts, citing examples where, during direct primaries, winning candidates were allocated votes exceeding the total votes cast in subsequent general elections, highlighting the unreliability of direct primaries.
“We have also witnessed situations of forced consensus, like the recent case of the Osun APC Governorship primaries,” the parties said.
The opposition emphasized that political parties should determine their own mode of nominating candidates, stating:
“There can only be one reason for this particular amendment: to create chaos and disorder within opposition parties in the hope that they would not be able to present candidates, leaving President Tinubu as the only serious candidate in the 2027 presidential election. What they are working towards is the coronation of Tinubu in 2027. Therefore, we find this amendment in bad faith and reject it outrightly.”
They promised to explore every constitutional means to safeguard the independence of political parties.
The parties called on the National Assembly to immediately commence a fresh amendment of the Electoral Act, 2026, to remove all obnoxious provisions and ensure that the Act reflects the will and aspirations of Nigerians for a free, fair, transparent, and credible electoral process.
“Nothing short of this will be acceptable to Nigerians,” they demanded.
