The Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, has defended the Senate’s ongoing amendment of the Electoral Act, saying critics are misjudging lawmakers based on an incomplete legislative process.
Akpabio insisted that the Senate did not remove electronic transmission of election results in the amendment of the Act.
The Senate President spoke in Abuja as special guest of honour at the unveiling of a book, The Burden of Legislators in Nigeria, authored by Senator Effiong Bob.
He noted that the lawmakers only questioned the requirement for real-time transmission.
The clarification follows criticism from opposition parties over reports that the Senate had rejected mandatory real-time electronic transmission of election results in the amended Electoral Act.
Responding to critics, Akpabio said the Senate had not concluded work on the bill and that public debate was premature.
“The Electoral Act amendment is incomplete. We have not completed it, but they are already on television. They don’t understand lawmaking.
“They don’t even know that what is in the Senate is not completed until we look at the Votes and Proceedings,” he said.
He criticised commentators for what he described as “abuse” of the legislature, accusing some civil society actors of attempting to impose their views on lawmakers.
“People have become mouth legislators. Go and contest election if you want to talk about lawmaking and go and join them and make the law. Retreats are not lawmaking; retreats are part of consultations. So why do you think that the paper you agreed on in Lagos during a retreat must be what is agreed on the floor?” he asked.
“I must state clearly, without ambiguity, that the Senate has not removed any means of transmission. If you want to use a bicycle to carry your votes from one polling unit to the ward centre, do so. If you want to use your phone to transmit, do so. If you want to use your iPad, do so,” he added.
The former Akwa Ibom governor said the concern was that mandating real-time transmission could lead to legal disputes if network failures occurred during elections.
“All we said was that we should remove the word ‘real time,’ because if you say real time and there is a grid failure and the network is not working, when you go to court, somebody will say it ought to have been real time,” he explained.
According to him, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) should determine the mode and timing of result transmission within the framework of the law.
The Senate President warned that insisting on real-time transmission could invalidate results in areas with poor connectivity or insecurity.
“Real time means that in over nine states where networks are not working because of insecurity, there will be no election results. Nationally, if the national grid collapses and no network is working, no election results will be valid,” he said.
Akpabio said electoral reforms must be grounded in legal and institutional capacity, warning against imposing technology beyond the country’s infrastructure.
He added that mistrust of institutions without understanding legislative processes could weaken democracy.
“When people do not understand their legislature, democracy is at risk. Democracy is measured not by passion alone, but by principles,” he said.
“We insist now and always that the electoral reforms must be anchored in law, guided by capacity, secured against abuse and applied uniformly across the nation.
“Technology must serve democracy. It must not endanger democracy, particularly untested technology. No matter how enthusiastic you are, you jump beyond the capacity of your consciousness.
“You stay in a place that even has no wire. You have never had light. You are lining up to vote. And you want to come and put in the law, real time. And you don’t even have light. You are not even giving the people light in your community. We must make progress. Progress must not bring about injustice.”
