Ex-INEC Director Osaze-Uzzi Questions How 1.5 Million Questionable Voter Records Entered Register

Former Director of Voter and Publicity Education at the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Oluwole Osaze-Uzzi, has questioned how 1.5 million questionable voter records were allowed into the commission's register.

Speaking in an interview on Arise Television, Osaze-Uzzi said such anomalies should not occur, given the technological safeguards INEC has put in place to block multiple registrations and other irregularities. He stressed that the legal criteria for voter eligibility are clear and should make the process simpler.

"The work ordinarily ought to be easier for the commission. The law is quite clear about who is entitled to be on the register: you're a Nigerian citizen, you're 18 years and above, and then you go there, and you register. It's as simple as that," he said.

Pointing to the mandatory physical presence and biometric capture required for registration, he expressed confusion over how millions of questionable entries got past the security measures. "You must turn up physically for the registration. So it should be a straightforward, simple process. But Nigeria, being what it is, the simpler it is, the more complex things, issues, and challenges arise from those things. I don't know how up to 1.5 million entries can be made in the register. You've heard of AI. You've heard of multiple registrants. That ought not to be with things that have been put in place by the commission," he added.

Osaze-Uzzi noted that INEC has yet to clarify the timeframe covered by the database review or explain how the flawed entries were first detected. He said that while tools such as the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) and artificial intelligence can help filter out duplicates, INEC must give a transparent account of how the records entered the database in the first place.