Two days after the Senate’s sudden U-turn on real-time electronic transmission of election results, a new storyline is being pushed into the bloodstream of public debate on how Nigeria’s broadband is not ready; therefore, real-time uploads will fail.
Development Diaries reports that the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has come out with data that shows that the digital backbone required to support the migration to electronic transmission of election results is far from ready, particularly in rural areas.
A recent report by The Guardian on ‘How botched broadband plans ruin e-transmission of election results’ noted that Nigeria’s push to adopt electronic transmission of results is running into a harsh reality, as the country falls well short of the broadband coverage needed to support its digital ambitions.
While the headline sounds technical, the timing is political, because the real fight is not whether Nigeria has perfect broadband; it is whether the Electoral Act will force transparency or legalise discretion, and discretion is where election fraud lives.
Why does this timing smell like strategy?
The Senate reversed its earlier rejection of real-time electronic transmission after heavy pressure from civil society, labour, and the legal community, and decided that a joint committee of both chambers will now harmonise the Electoral Act amendment before it goes to the president.
Then, on the morning of 12 February, a news report frames broadband underperformance as the key barrier.
The report further states that, according to the NCC, Nigeria missed the 70 percent broadband penetration target under the 2020–2025 plan and sits at about 50.58 percent.
According to the NCC, 4,834 communities are unserved or underserved, and rural internet access is framed as 23 percent versus 57 percent in urban areas.
Those numbers may be real, but the real risk is not poor broadband but the legal loopholes that allow paper results to take priority whenever ‘communication failure’ is claimed.
That is the alibi.
While these gaps can complicate any nationwide digital system, including election technology, the electronic transmission of polling unit results is not a bandwidth-intensive task.
Telecom operators have long argued that sending a completed result sheet electronically is comparable to low-data messaging, not high-demand applications.
With compression, encryption, and store-and-forward design, results can be captured at polling units and transmitted once minimal connectivity is available.
Records from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) also support this, as during the 2023 elections, Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) successfully captured and transmitted 98 percent of polling data.
Delays and disputes happened, but the technology largely worked. What remains weak is the legal framework. If the law lets paper results override electronic records, the system is still vulnerable, and ‘network failure’ can be used strategically in insecure areas.
The more consequential issue lies in the reported structure of the Senate’s clause, which allows the paper result form (Form EC8A) to become the primary basis for collation when electronic transmission fails due to ‘communication failure’.
This is where the danger lies. If anyone can claim there was no network, and that claim automatically shifts the process back to manual handling, then the system returns to the same weak points that have caused election disputes in the past.
Responsibility lies with the National Assembly and its harmonisation committee to remove loopholes, with INEC to set clear transmission and audit rules, and with the NCC, Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF), and state governments to improve infrastructure without allowing it to be used as an excuse for opacity.
Lawmakers must remove any language that makes paper the primary source, require documented proof for communication failures, and force INEC to publish a public transmission protocol.
Nigerians should now insist that broadband gaps do not become legal excuses for opacity, while infrastructure and security improvements proceed in parallel.
Citizens should demand that the Senate–House committee publish the harmonised Clause 60(3) text immediately after agreement, not weeks later, reject loopholes that allow discretion, insist on verifiable electronic logs, and hold INEC accountable for real-time transmission.
If Nigeria’s lawmakers are serious about ‘real-time results’, they would write a law that makes transparency unavoidable, not ‘conditional’.
The broadband story is useful information, but it is politically intended to turn citizens’ demand for accountability into a debate about feasibility, so the old manipulation corridor survives under a new name.
