<\/p>\n
A non-profit organisation, Yiaga Africa, has said that more than half of Nigerians do not trust the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).<\/p>\n
The group\u2019s Executive Director, Samson Itodo, stated this on Friday during an interview on Prime Time, a programme on Arise Television.<\/p>\n
Itodo said issues such as conflicting results from the same polling unit, election officials subverting the will of voters, and the pre-filling of result sheets have continued to erode public confidence in the electoral body.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s very dangerous. It is clear from the survey that more than half of Nigerians don\u2019t trust INEC, and they don\u2019t trust INEC for several reasons. One, it\u2019s the way and manner and their experience with previous elections,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
According to him, the level of distrust is not surprising, given the experiences of voters over time, adding that the problem goes beyond INEC alone.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s also the conduct of the other actors within the election value chain \u2013 the security agencies, the judiciary.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of these actors, their conduct, inactions or mismanagement of the electoral process have adverse effects on the way citizens perceive elections,\u201d Itodo said.<\/p>\n
He noted that the widespread distrust is evident among citizens and explained that this was why the current INEC chairman has repeatedly acknowledged the need for the commission to do more to build trust and confidence.<\/p>\n
Itodo stressed that how INEC handles logistics, result management, collation and transmission, as well as political party registration, is crucial to restoring public faith in the system.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith primaries set to begin soon, how INEC manages the nomination process, the primaries and congresses, and how it scrutinises and accepts candidates\u2019 lists from political parties will matter a lot,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He warned that accepting candidates\u2019 lists from parties that did not conduct valid primaries would seriously damage the integrity of the commission.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn a situation where INEC accepts a list of candidates from political parties when validly conducted primaries have not held, it would really cast a blight on the integrity of the commission,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
While commending the INEC chairman for consistently speaking about the need to inspire trust since assuming office, Itodo said stakeholders must remain vigilant.<\/p>\n
He linked declining voter turnout to the way electoral actors manage the process, noting that poor management directly affects citizens\u2019 willingness to participate.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A non-profit organisation, Yiaga Africa, has said that more than half of Nigerians do not trust the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The group\u2019s Executive Director, Samson Itodo, stated this on Friday during an interview on Prime Time, a programme on Arise Television. Itodo said issues such as conflicting results from the same polling unit, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":240175,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5],"tags":[1185,780],"class_list":["post-240174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-inec","tag-nigerians"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/IMG_4244.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240174\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}