During his tenure as the National Chairman of INEC, Professor Mahmood Yakubu made grand promises regarding the implementation of technology to deliver the best election experience for Nigerians.

However, instead of receiving praise for fulfilling his commitment, some individuals believe that Yakubu’s actual delivery fell short of expectations, particularly regarding the real-time upload of results from polling units, which turned out to be misleading.

To address this issue, Yakubu had initially opted for a new voter accreditation technology known as the Bi-modal Voter Accreditation System. This decision was based on the desire to enhance the election process, and the system had been tested in several bye-elections and off-cycle governorship elections prior to its planned implementation.

Furthermore, as part of the early choice in election technology, the decision was made to provide public access to polling units’ election results. This decision was in response to the longstanding demand of citizens and election observers. To facilitate this, INEC developed the INEC Results Viewing Portal (IREV), a dedicated web portal that allows the public to view the results of polling units as soon as they are finalized on election day.

This technology has been successfully implemented in numerous elections conducted by the commission in recent years. Specifically, the uploading of polling unit results to the IREV portal has been utilized in 105 constituencies where the commission conducted off-season elections since August 2020. The portal continues to serve as an invaluable repository of election results in Nigeria, functioning as an archive for historical election data.

Both citizens and registered users on the portal still have the ability to access and view the election results. It is important to note that the uploaded results on the IREV portal consist of scanned images of the original result sheets. These same hard copies are provided to party agents at the respective polling units on election day. To ensure accuracy and transparency, Professor Yakubu consistently encouraged candidates and politicians to compare the results displayed on the IREV portal with the hard copies brought by their polling agents in case of any discrepancies. The system boasts an impressive accuracy rate of 99.9 percent, and the results remain accessible on the portal for reference and verification.

November 22, 2022

In response to an exclusive story published by Vanguard, Professor Yakubu, aiming to clarify the situation, stated the following:

I would like to take this opportunity to address a story circulating in the media claiming that the commission has decided to abandon the real-time uploading of polling unit results on Election Day. I want to make it clear that this story is false and should be disregarded as fake news. The commission remains committed to uploading polling unit-level results, and citizens will have immediate access to these results as they are uploaded from the polling units. This innovative approach was introduced by the commission itself, and we have no intention of undermining it.

We firmly believe in the importance of this technology, and we stand by our commitment to upload polling unit results for citizens to view. After all, our ultimate purpose is to serve the citizens. Denying them access to the results of the electoral process conducted at their respective polling units would be contradictory to our mission. I want to assure you that the upcoming 2023 election will be the best yet, and we are fully dedicated to ensuring that the votes cast by Nigerians will genuinely determine the outcome of the elections, without any interference.