2027 Elections: Amupitan tasks INEC staff to be ready and breaks 20-year tradition of zonal tour

2027 Elections: Amupitan tasks INEC staff to be ready and breaks 20-year tradition of zonal tour

From our political correspondent

Abuja (Core Reporters) As preparations for the 2027 general elections gather momentum, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Joash Amupitan, (SAN), on Monday, September 7, 2026, declared open the South West Zone Interactive Meeting and Assessment of Preparedness for the 2027 General Elections, describing the undertaking as a departure from over two decades of administrative tradition where zonal preparations were handled exclusively through the head office directions.

The event, held in Lagos, marked the start of a six-zone nationwide tour designed to assess the Commission’s operational preparedness ahead of the Presidential and National Assembly elections scheduled for Saturday, January 16, 2027, and the Governorship and State Houses of Assembly elections scheduled for Saturday, February 6, 2027.

Professor Amupitan said he was accompanied by national commissioners and directors of the Commission headquarters to engage directly with electoral officials and administrative staff, who he described as the frontline guardians of Nigerian democracy.

He said the true measure of electoral success was not determined in boardrooms in Abuja, but in local government areas, registration centers and polling units where field officers manage the day-to-day mechanics of the electoral process.

The President noted that the Commission is building on the success of the recent off-cycle elections, particularly the off-cycle governorship elections of Osun State, which he said demonstrate the capacity of the Commission when operational discipline, technical expertise and administrative integrity converge.

However, he cautioned that the scale of the 2027 general election, a simultaneous exercise in 36 states and the federal capital territory, would require a higher standard of performance than any single state exercise.

Professor Amupitan identified voter apathy, a persistent trust deficit and the spread of disinformation as the key challenges facing the Commission, underlining that the conduct and competence of field staff remains the Commission’s strongest defense against false narratives.

On voter registration, the President disclosed that the Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) exercise, conducted in three phases between August 2025 and July 2026, had registered a cumulative total of 10,772,421 new registrants, subject to the ongoing Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS) verification.

He said the third phase of the CVR introduced, for the first time in Nigeria, an online registration portal to facilitate access to eligible voters, along with a new printable permanent voter card (PVC) technology implemented for the first time during elections in Osun State, in line with Section 18(1) of the Electoral Law.

Prof. Amupitan said the Commission’s national voter register is approaching the 100 million mark and reiterated the Commission’s commitment to ensuring that no eligible Nigerian is disenfranchised due to logistical bottlenecks in PVC distribution.

On technology, the INEC Chairman said the Commission is refining its results management systems, including the recently introduced eEC8A, to strengthen the verifiability of results from the polling unit to the national collation centre.

He reiterated the Commission’s zero-tolerance stance towards partisan conduct and administrative negligence of staff, citing Section 26 of the Election Law, which imposes an oath of neutrality for election officials, presiding officers, election officials and security personnel involved in elections.

The INEC Chairman also revealed that the Commission is finalizing a new salary and benefit package for INEC staff, Commission members and resident election commissioners, including the new Consolidated Electoral Management Body Salary Structure (CEMBSS), which will come into effect from 1 January 2026, and a 150% increase in general allocations to states from 1 July 2026.

In his welcome address, the Resident Electoral Commissioner for Lagos State, Professor Ayobami Salami, described Lagos as honored to host the maiden edition of the zonal engagement, stressing that electoral credibility is built over time through early preparation, competent staff and effective coordination rather than determined solely on election day.

Professor Salami said the South West presents a diverse election environment that requires preparedness assessments that go beyond routine checklists to examine the resilience of logistics, the reliability of technology and the strength of stakeholder engagement across the six states.

He commended the Commission’s leadership for prioritizing timely preparation and described the Commission’s staff as its greatest asset in safeguarding the credibility of the 2027 general elections.

Outlining the objectives of the engagement, Director of Planning and Monitoring, Helen Ajayi, told participants that the interactive meeting was designed around four key objectives: assess the state of preparedness of Southwestern states through the presentation of situation reports on logistics, ad hoc staff recruitment, technology, security, training, voter education and stakeholder engagement; identify operational and logistical challenges within states that could impact the success of the 2027 general election; provide departmental updates on voter registration, permanent voter ID collection, and implementation and management of other ICT resources; and align all staff with the Commission’s code of conduct as well as its operational and logistical preparation before the elections.

The interactive session featured departmental engagements regarding voter registration, election technology, staff conduct, logistics and statewide situation reports from election commissioners residing in the Southwest Zone.

The Lagos pledge marks the opening leg of a six-zone nationwide tour by the Commission’s leadership, as INEC steps up preparations for what will be one of the most closely watched election cycles in Nigeria’s democratic history.