Electronic transmission of election results can fail, we must do what we can get right —Yerima Shettima

Comrade Yerima Shettima is the Convener of the Northern Stakeholders Consultative Initiative (NSCI), a political advocacy group promoting the interests of Northern Nigeria.

YOU’VE previously spoken about voter apathy in Nigeria. Now the Senate has refused to make electronic transmission of results mandatory, the very reform citizens have demanded for years. Do you think voters will trust the system when the National Assembly appears to ignore their core concerns about electoral transparency?

The issue of mandatory transmission of election results has been brought to the front burner in the last two years. Despite the money being invested into the project, we have not gotten it right. Probably, it is not yet time. Probably, there is this wisdom on the part of the major stakeholders to have seen that why don’t we do it in our normal conventional way, pending when things are clear, because oftentimes there have always been issues that either there’s no network where these elections are being conducted. So one cannot say automatically that if we go through the electronic transmission stuff, we’re likely going to get it right. So for me, if they make it in a normal conventional way and do the needful, perhaps I think we can still get it right if we choose to. I will have to look at both sides of the coin: through the analogue way and that of the electronic way suggested by the Senate. Either way you look at it, there are advantages and there are also disadvantages.

We have seen cases where people go for their data capture and it fails. We have seen the case where even [former President Goodluck] Jonathan went for an election and they couldn’t capture him until he went home and came back after a while before finally, as the president of the country, he was captured. This technology can fail. So I’m not saying that it’s a bad idea to go electronically, but as it stands today, we need to get it right because oftentimes we begin to have this issue of people, or the populace, losing confidence in our electoral system, and that is not spelling good at all for our country. Once the electorate loses confidence and they begin to find themselves in this hullabaloo situation, I don’t think it will spell good for us. It rather spells doom. So for me, we have to look at both ways. And I think in their wisdom, having done that, they must have their reason for doing that. So let us not be in a hurry to conclude or preempt that it’s an attempt to undermine our electoral processes and so on and so forth. This is my view about it.

After the 2023 elections, the argument from some was that in some places you saw a different result uploaded and then some hours later you saw that the result sheets presented at the collation centre had been manipulated. They argue that’s not transparency. So are we moving forward without mandatory transmission?

Both you and I were witnesses to what happened in the 2023 election where there were allegations that even the results online were hacked and hijacked. You and I were witnesses to all of this. We seem to forget things so easily, so fast. Do you remember? There was this story of hacking.

Yes, but that was in 2022. Then, INEC chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, claimed that the result viewing portal (IReV) was hacked during the 2022 Ekiti and Osun states governorship elections.

This is the same thing we’re likely going to face, because who are the electoral umpires? The same INEC. The same INEC. The same story came. And whether we go electronically or we go through transfer or whichever form we do, at the end of the day, the INEC still has a role. They are the same umpire. They have that responsibility to announce results and put it anyhow they choose to, whether right or wrong. So, do we continue to revisit matters like this and continue doing it the way it is, or will we find a way? As you know, in the interim, now that the situation has gotten to this level, we’ve made first attempt, it failed. Second attempt, it failed. Why don’t we do it this way and move on? We had the same case even during the Buhari regime in 2019. We had the same story in 2023 on the same hacking. In fact, some years back, when Trump was coming up, there was also this allegation that when the election was conducted in America in 2016, it was Russia that hacked the cyber. At the end of the day, the thing went in favour of Trump, not because Trump got it right.

READ ALSO: South-West cannot achieve full potential without strong civil service — Adeleke

If advanced countries such as America will also raise an alarm like this, it means there is something we need to get right and put right. We shouldn’t be in a hurry to assume that because Americans are doing it, or other developed nations are doing it and they are getting it right, we should do the same. Even within the circles of developed nations, we have seen all manners of stories. How much more third world countries, Africa and other places? We have the same problems here and there. Why don’t we just do what we think we can? Oftentimes, we continue to borrow ideas from the Western world, and even the Western world are not getting it right. So for me, this election coming, we must get it right or it will spell serious doom for the country because already people are angry. Let us not get confused. Let us do it in a way that is clearly more transparent.

Coming into this process of Electoral Act amendment in the National Assembly, the idea was electoral reform. Are you convinced right now that there has been any reform?

So far, so good. There are areas that I think have been considered and there are also other issues that have not been considered. But what matters before us is that we must get it right, no matter how it goes. So for me, I’m not the kind of person that believes that we should just do things anyhow. Let us think and look at our own local way of doing things and get it right. Whether you do it locally or do it in a very civil way or in any form, if we can get it right, that’s what matters more now. Because we need to bring about sanity in our systems.

What are your hopes for voter confidence ahead of 2027? In the 1999 elections, Nigeria had over 50 per cent turnout, but that percentage has come down significantly since then. 2023 was the worst on record since 1999, with less than 27 per cent turnout recorded. So do you have hopes, in light of these conversations about mandatory transmission of election results or not, that voters will trust the outcome of the upcoming elections?

The Independent National Electoral Commission and the National Orientation Agency under the federal government must be seen to do more because Nigerians are gradually losing confidence in our electronic system, and that’s our fear. That’s one of the reasons why I say, look, let us just get it right. Whether through electronic transmission or whichever way, let us look at the way we can do it so that we can also bring back confidence to our electorate in these electoral processes. Otherwise, we wake up one day and somebody will just sit down, form a result, and give it out without even going through the normal process. And that is what we are likely going to face.

So there is a lot of responsibility on the part of INEC and even the federal government to ensure they go all out to sensitise Nigerians, conscientise Nigerians, and tell them what to do and do it right, so that at the end of the day this confidence will be brought back and people will begin to have hope and confidence that they are going to elect people and those they elect will come to office and give them what they want. But for as long as we continue to do it in this manner where people begin to lose confidence in our electoral system, it may not spell good for us. Don’t forget, look at what we are experiencing in some Saharan countries and other places within African countries. I don’t think, and I pray, we don’t get to that level. So we must be mindful and careful of some of those things.

You keep saying we have to get it right. What does “getting it right” mean? Who are those people you are trusting to get it right?

Those in power. Those in power. The National Assembly. Yes. I’m talking about those in power.

There’s widespread anger at the National Assembly right now, with many Nigerians expressing low confidence in their ability to deliver credible electoral reform. So do you expect the same set of people to get it right?

Well, we cannot import people from outside our country to do it for us. And at the same time, those who will do it must also be human, and those humans are within us. No matter how we look at it, no matter how we complain, we cannot rule it out completely and say that among them there are no people with integrity that we can trust. We can only find them within ourselves. So let us have hope, keep working, and insist that the right thing be done. As a people, collectively, we can push it even when they are not willing. We will do it. But we need to unite ourselves, have the country at heart, and pursue an agenda that will be good for our own country. And that’s the only thing we need to do.