Former Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Attahiru Jega, has advised the Nigerian government and electoral stakeholders to proceed with caution in the deployment of electronic voting systems, warning that the country’s deficient technological infrastructure and legal limitations could severely hinder successful implementation.
Jega made these remarks during a panel session at the June 12 edition of The Platform Africa, where he engaged in a frank assessment of Nigeria’s electoral challenges and prospects, especially concerning the role of technology and the involvement of academics in election management.
“If we do a realistic assessment, we see that there are a lot of gaps in technology infrastructure,” Jega stated. “We need to outstrain how far you go in terms of the use of technology.”
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When asked on global best practices as the moderator referenced Estonia, Jega responded saying Estonia —a small, technologically advanced nation known for its successful use of internet voting—but quickly highlighted the disparity in infrastructure between Estonia and Nigeria.
“In Estonia, they use internet voting and so on. It’s a very small country, but of course they are more advanced in terms of the infrastructure that can help use technology. In Nigeria, you are still struggling with internet service in some areas. Not to talk about our rural areas, which are terribly underserved,” he said.
Jega warned against assuming that Nigeria can leap into full-scale electronic voting simply because citizens use mobile technology for banking and communication.
According to him, election integrity requires far more stringent technological safeguards than personal transactions.
“Don’t make the mistake of saying that those individuals use mobile systems for personal transactions, then you can use that for elections. Security, cyber security will not be there,” he warned. “Mobile technology, which you use for financial transactions by individuals, you cannot use that for elections. In Nigeria, it’s not.”
The former INEC boss also noted the historical context of technological integration in Nigerian elections. He explained that despite public expectations for rapid modernization following the 2015 elections, legal and infrastructural barriers have slowed progress.
“After the 2015 election, people thought by 2019, we should be using electronic voting. The Indians are still not using electronic voting. They are using something like mechanical voting,” Jega observed.” We have to make sure that we don’t take a jump in which there are no steps. So my argument is that it’s possible, for example, to insist that… And we’ve started that.”
He further pointed out that until 2022, Nigeria’s Electoral Act explicitly prohibited electronic voting.
“By 2015, up to 2019, there was no legal framework for even piloting electronic voting. The Electoral Act expressly prohibited electronic voting. It is only in 2022 that that was removed,” he noted.
Despite the removal of that legal restriction, Jega stressed that little has changed in terms of the underlying infrastructure necessary to support a robust electronic voting system.
“Not much has happened in terms of improvement of the infrastructure that we require. So frankly, yes, we should do that, but we should make this slow. It’s not something that can happen immediately,” he said.
On the issue of using university lecturers in elections, Jega firmly defended the practice, calling it a necessary corrective measure to curb internal corruption within INEC. According to him, before his tenure, resident electoral commissioners and electoral officers handled vote collation and result declarations—often to their own financial benefit.
“The resident electoral commissioners were the ones who were declaring more national election results in the states. And the electoral officers at the local government level were the ones who were actually declaring results at the local government level… they turned it into clearly a money-making adventure,” he revealed.
This led to Jega’s initiative to involve academics, whom he believed had a greater sense of integrity and impartiality.
“So where can we get people who can help us do that? I tried Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), they said they are not going to touch elections. Elections is going to mess up their integrity. Because the election was terrible at the time we came to ILEM.”
Jega, however, leveraged his influence as a former co-chairman of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors to bring reputable academic staff into the electoral process under a transparent selection model.
“So I now use the vice-chancellors to help us get academic staff using a good, transparent selection criteria and they will vouch for them. And that’s how we started using accredited staff in the election.”
He emphasized that while isolated cases of misconduct have occurred, the overwhelming majority of professors have conducted themselves with dignity and professionalism.
“We use thousands of university professors and senior lecturers… The people who are suited to make it through is statistically insignificant, but that is what the media and I want—to find two people who have committed an offence, it is what goes in the news… Frankly, the level of integrity they brought to the election… Substantial, overwhelming majority of them are not going to damage their integrity that they built over the years on the matters of politics.”
Jega cited instances from the 2011 and 2015 elections to support his claim, underscoring that only about two professors have been prosecuted for electoral offences.
“Of course, politicians use all methods of inducement. But the fact that only about two professors… have actually been prosecuted for electoral offences, frankly, statistically insignificant.”
Looking forward, Jega advocated a phased approach to technology deployment, beginning with pilot tests in select cities and professional elections.
“Now that the ban has been lifted, it’s now for INEC to begin to, first of all, look at what technologies are available, which technologies are adaptable, and which ones can they even start to pilot test. For example, in cities, maybe in Abuja or in elections of professional associations, you can deploy electronic voting systems to begin to pilot a test.”
Professor Jega’s comments come at a critical time, as Nigeria seeks to reform its electoral processes ahead of future national polls. His cautionary note underscores the importance of infrastructure readiness, legislative support, and institutional integrity in embracing innovation—lessons he believes the country must heed if it is to build a credible and technologically sound electoral system.
“Everybody recognises that we need to upscale the use of technology. But we have to be very, very careful about that,” Jega concluded.
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