Nigerians Fume As INEC Fails To Update Result Viewing Portal

The failure of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to update it result viewing portal (IReV) with election results despite the close of voting in many parts of the country has drawn the ire of Nigerians.

The commission had earlier vowed to ensure that results are uploaded into the IREV portal as soon as voting and counting is concluded in accordance with the 2022 Electoral Act.

During his Chatham House address, INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, had promised that the commission will upload results on election day.

“As I have said repeatedly, the commission’s allegiance is to Nigeria. Our loyalty is to Nigerians who want free, fair, credible, and verifiable elections supported by technology, which guarantees transparent accreditation and upload of polling unit results for citizens to view in real-time on election day,” he said.

However, hours after the end of voting during Saturday’s presidential and national assembly elections, the portal is yet to be updated with any election results.

When THE WHISTLER checked the portal around 6:12pm no result from the 176,846 polling units scattered across the country has been uploaded.

Another check at 9:55pm had a similar outcome with no result appearing on the portal.

This has led to speculations that the electoral umpire might compromise the election as citizens can’t view the result in real time.

Some Nigerians took to micro-blogging platform Twitter to express frustration with the inability of INEC to upload the election results.

Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, a governorship aspirant in Lagos state wrote, “at 4pm, attempts to upload through the BVAS shows “the portal is not yet open” Our Agents have now had to follow the Inec officers to the collation center. @ineclagos @inecnigeria how is the Portal still closed. When we are supposed to be transmitting directly from the PU.”

Oby Ezekwesili, a former Minister of education tweeted, “What is IReV? 🤔 It is the acronym for INEC Result Viewing (ReV) portal. The IReV is linked to all BVASs at PUs to enable @inecnigeria officials do a real-time transmission of the uploaded results at your Polling Units on Election Day.”

One of Labour Party presidential campaign spokespersons, Dele Farotimi, said the failure to upload results on the portal is an indication of plans to rig the election.

“One of the ways unscrupulous @inecnigeria officials are RIGGING the elections nationwide is by refusing to upload the results of the presidential elections particularly. This has been seen almost throughout @ineclagos and similar stories are cropping up all over the country 🤔”

Olajumoke Alawode-James tweeted, “We didn’t allow our INEC officials go, because they weren’t uploading results to the portal. Eventually the police came to intervene and residents followed them to the Ikeja collation centre, along side polling agents.”

@ayemojubar wrote, “Dear @inecnigeria, INEC Result Viewing Portal is not accessible. Login is timing out.”

Human rights lawyer, Inibehe Effiong wrote, “The INEC portal is not working. Staff are unable to upload results.”