By Lemmy Ughegbe, Ph.D
The Senate’s recent rejection of real-time electronic transmission of election results has reopened an old wound in Nigeria’s democratic journey. It is a decision that goes beyond legislative caution or technical disagreement. It strikes at the heart of electoral credibility and forces a question that can no longer be dodged: who exactly is afraid of real-time electronic transmission of votes?
Certainly not ordinary Nigerians. The average voter is not afraid of transparency. The woman who queues for hours to vote, the elderly man who insists on performing his civic duty despite insecurity, the young corps member who risks hostility to serve as an ad hoc official, none of them fear instant verification of results.
If anything, they long for it. What they fear is the familiar disappearance of their votes somewhere between the polling unit and the collation centre.
Real-time electronic transmission threatens only one thing: the space for post-voting manipulation. For decades, Nigeria’s most abused electoral corridor has not been the ballot box itself, but the journey after voting ends.
Results announced at polling units somehow mutate during collation. Margins grow mysteriously. Figures change quietly. Legal battles replace public confidence. Real-time transmission closes that corridor. Once results are uploaded instantly and made visible simultaneously, the room for discreet alteration shrinks dramatically.
That is why resistance persists. The arguments advanced against real-time transmission often sound reasonable at first hearing. Network coverage. Cost. Cybersecurity. Capacity. But none of these objections survives serious scrutiny, especially when placed alongside comparative experience from other democracies.
In Ghana, biometric verification and electronic transmission have become integral to electoral administration. While Ghana’s elections are not without controversy, disputes are now political rather than structural. Losers contest outcomes, but the process itself enjoys far greater public confidence because results are verifiable and traceable.
Kenya’s experience offers another instructive example. After years of disputed elections and national trauma, electronic transmission was introduced as part of broader reforms. Technology did not eliminate conflict, but it fundamentally altered its character.
Electoral disputes now focus on system integrity and legal interpretation rather than wholesale fabrication of figures. Citizens can see results as they are transmitted, limiting suspicion of backroom manipulation.
Beyond Africa, the contrast is even more instructive. Brazil has operated electronic voting and rapid result transmission for years. Outcomes are known within hours, not days. While political actors may challenge results rhetorically, the credibility of the system constrains how far such claims can travel. Transparency limits mischief.
India, the world’s largest democracy, manages elections involving hundreds of millions of voters using electronic voting machines and rapid transmission protocols. If India, with its vast geography, diversity, and infrastructural challenges, can deploy technology to secure electoral credibility, it is difficult to argue convincingly that Nigeria’s challenges are insurmountable.
These comparisons expose a simple truth: resistance to real-time electronic transmission is rarely technical. It is political. A political system confident in its popularity welcomes transparency. One uncertainty about its legitimacy is the lack of verification. Governments and parties that trust voters do not fear systems that confirm outcomes instantly. Those uncomfortable with verification often prefer opacity, delay, and discretion.
The Senate’s posture, therefore, sends a deeply troubling signal. Legislatures exist to strengthen democratic institutions, not to preserve the weaknesses that undermine them. When lawmakers choose opacity over transparency, they invite questions about motive rather than competence.
The concern deepened further when the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, while setting the tone for deliberations on amending the Electoral Act 2022, cautioned his colleagues that “we have to be careful with it, so that we do not end up regretting it at the election petition tribunal.” The import of that statement could not have been lost on anyone paying attention.
Electoral laws are meant to protect the sanctity of the vote, not to provide future insulation at tribunals. When reform is framed around anxiety about post-election litigation rather than a commitment to transparency, democratic priorities are inverted.
The focus is not on how best to guarantee credible elections, but on how to avoid legal vulnerability after contested outcomes. That is not reform. It is risk management for power.
This moment also exposes Nigeria’s deeper trust deficit. Citizens doubt the electoral umpire. They doubt political parties. They question the fairness of judicial outcomes when election petitions drag on long after winners have been sworn in. In such an environment, every reform that enhances transparency should be embraced. Instead, it is resisted.
Nigeria has normalised delayed justice in electoral matters. Disputes linger. Political authority settles. Court judgments arrive when the consequences are largely symbolic. Justice is not denied outright. It is neutralised by time. Real-time electronic transmission would not eliminate litigation, but it would significantly narrow the scope of dispute by anchoring results in immediate public visibility.
Opponents of reform often argue that Nigeria should move gradually. But gradualism has become a euphemism for stagnation. Democracy does not mature by postponing accountability. It matures by honestly confronting its vulnerabilities.
Cybersecurity concerns are also frequently exaggerated. No system is risk-free. But paper-based systems are not safer. They are merely less traceable. Ballot boxes can be hijacked. Result sheets can be altered. Collation centres can be compromised. Electronic systems at least leave digital trails. They can be audited. Opacity is not security.
At its core, resistance to real-time transmission is resistance to loss of control. It removes discretion from powerful intermediaries. It limits post-election negotiation of outcomes. It shifts power decisively to voters and observers. It replaces trust in individuals with trust in systems.
That shift is uncomfortable for political actors who have mastered elections as logistics rather than as processes of consent. Yet the cost of resisting reform is enormous. When citizens lose faith in elections, they disengage. Voter turnout declines.
Cynicism deepens. Extremism finds fertile ground. Democracy becomes ritual rather than choice. Nigeria is already showing symptoms of this fatigue. Each election cycle ends with litigation, protest, and doubt. Reform cannot remain optional.
The Senate must therefore reflect on the message it sends. To reject real-time electronic transmission in a country struggling with electoral credibility is to appear afraid of electoral transparency and accountability. And in politics, perception matters as much as intention.
The question is not whether real-time transmission is perfect. The question is whether Nigeria can afford to continue pretending that opacity protects democracy. It does not. It corrodes it.
So, who is afraid of real-time electronic voting transmission? Not the voter. Not civil society. Not election observers. Not democracies that value credibility. The fear belongs to those who know that once votes are seen instantly, power must finally flow from the people, not from the process. And that is a fear Nigeria must confront, not accommodate.
Dr Lemmy Ughegbe, FIMC, CMC
Email: lemmyughegbeofficial@gmail.com
WhatsApp ONLY: +2348069716645
