From David Onuoja, Abuja
The Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Joash Amupitan, has directed for a comprehensive review of Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) records in the South-East, and the dismantling of all bottlenecks hindering Permanent Voters Cards (PVCs), distribution ahead of the 2027 General Election.
Professor Amupitan gave the directive on Tuesday, in Enugu at the South-East Zonal Interactive Meeting with Staff and Readiness Assessment for the 2027 General Election, stating that the Commission’s primary operational focus in the zone is to ensure no eligible citizen is disenfranchised.
“Our objective is uncompromising: no eligible citizen who registered should be disenfranchised by administrative or logistical friction, noting that the National Register of Voters now stands at over 103 million”, he declared.
The INEC Chairman also disclosed that in line with Section 10 of the Electoral Act 2026, the Commission conducted three phases of CVR, with Phase I from August 25 to December 10, 2025 registering 2,611,266 voters, Phase II from January 5 to April 17, 2026 registering 4,121,835, and Phase III from May 11 to July 26, 2026 registering 3,867,997, bringing total new registrants to 10,772,421 subject to ABIS deduplication.
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He said the Commission introduced for the first time the Online Registration Portal in Phase III to eliminate barriers of distance and time, and has activated Printable PVC technology under Section 18(1) of the Electoral Act 2026 to ensure that “waiting for months to pick up a voter’s card becomes a relic of the past”.
The Enugu engagement, the third in the nationwide tour after the South-West edition in Lagos on September 7 and North-West in Kaduna on September 28, is historic as no INEC Chairman had visited the Enugu office since 1999, marking a break from remote governance.
“Today, as we bring our nationwide tour to the South-East, we will continue to break that tradition of remote governance. The true success of any election is not decided solely in the meeting rooms of our headquarters in Abuja. It is decided in the field,” Amupitan said.
INEC boss reminded officials that the 2027 polls will be a simultaneous national assignment across 36 states and FCT involving over 103 million voters and 176,846 polling units, with Presidential and National Assembly elections on January 16, 2027 and Governorship and State Houses of Assembly on February 6, 2027, stressing that “the statutory timeline is fixed, and the clock is ticking.”
The Chairman disclosed that nine of 14 major milestones in the Revised Timetable have been executed following the recent World Press Conference to mark 100 days to first ballot, and commended staff for successful conduct of off-cycle governorship polls in Anambra, Ekiti and Osun, FCT Area Councils and 16 bye-elections.
He however identified trust deficit, voter apathy and misinformation as greatest challenges, warning that “a single malicious fake news post, an unverified rumour, or a deepfake video can travel across millions of screens in seconds,” and that staff conduct remains the strongest defence against fake news.
On security, Amupitan said partnership with the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES) has been reinvigorated, with intelligence-driven architecture through Election Risk Management tools, disclosing that DSS has arrested those behind threats to ad-hoc staff, especially Corps members, who will soon be prosecuted.
He said the zonal assessment will cover seven pillars including voter registration, technological upgrades including eEC8A verification platform and IReV, code of conduct, logistics and situation reports, warning that partisan leaning and extortion will not be tolerated under Section 26 of the Electoral Act which requires oath of neutrality.
On welfare and logistics, the Chairman disclosed procurement of brand-new operational pick-ups under zero-failure protocol, constitution of Electoral Logistics Committee chaired by Rear Admiral Jamila Malafa (rtd), creation of Consolidated Election Management Body Salary Structure (CEMBSS) effective January 1, 2026, and 150 percent increase in monthly overhead to State Offices effective July 1, 2026.
