Nigeria’s national voter register is approaching 100 million ahead of the 2027 general elections, with the Independent National Electoral Commission recording 10,772,421 new registrants during its latest Continuous Voter Registration exercise.
INEC Chairman, Prof. Joash Amupitan, disclosed this on Monday in Lagos, September 7, where he also announced plans to deploy a real-time election readiness tracker to monitor preparations across the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory. Amupitan spoke at a two-day strategic operational workshop for the commission’s administrative secretaries.
According to a statement by INEC’s Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Victoria Eta-Messi, the readiness tracker will provide the commission’s leadership with real-time updates on logistics, recruitment and training of ad hoc personnel, electoral technology and other preparations for the 2027 elections.
The system will be based on a standardised, Excel-based Administrative Secretary Master Operational Tracker Template linked to INEC’s Election Monitoring and Support Centre dashboard and Election Project Plan. Amupitan said INEC had historically lacked a dedicated and uniform system for monitoring the operational responsibilities of administrative secretaries nationwide.
He said the new framework would give Resident Electoral Commissioners, supervising national commissioners, the Secretary to the Commission and INEC headquarters “instant visibility” into the level of preparedness in each state. The tracker will monitor areas including the distribution of election materials, training of ad hoc personnel and general state-level readiness.
According to Amupitan, the initiative is intended to move INEC away from last-minute election preparations by replacing “reactive panic with proactive management.” He said the latest CVR exercise, conducted in three phases between August 2025 and July 2026, recorded 10,772,421 new registrants, although the figures remain subject to verification through the Automated Biometric Identification System.
Amupitan said the National Register of Voters was now “approaching the 100 million mark” and reaffirmed INEC’s commitment to ensuring that eligible Nigerians were not disenfranchised because of logistical problems in the distribution of Permanent Voter Cards. DownloadInteractive Maps
He identified the CVR as one of five major operational areas under review at the workshop, alongside logistics and materials management, electoral technology, optimisation of ad hoc staff and financial compliance. Amupitan said the readiness tracker would extend beyond the 2027 election cycle and serve as a permanent operational and onboarding framework for future administrative secretaries.
He said INEC was drawing lessons from recent off-cycle elections, particularly the Osun State governorship election, where the commission said disciplined logistics and functioning technology contributed to what it regarded as a transparent process. “We are now working to replicate that standard nationally,” he said. Amupitan said INEC had about six months to prepare for the 2027 general elections.
The presidential and National Assembly elections are scheduled for January 16, 2027, while the governorship and State Houses of Assembly elections are expected to hold on February 6, 2027. Lagos State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Prof. Ayobami Salami, described the workshop as timely and commended the European Union, through its Support to Democratic Governance in Nigeria programme, for supporting the exercise.
The Secretary to the Commission, Rose Oriaran-Anthony, said the workshop was designed to ensure that INEC headquarters and state offices operated from the same Election Project Plan. She said each state delegation was expected to leave the workshop with a logistics risk register, an ad hoc recruitment and deployment plan and a three-month stakeholder engagement plan.
At a separate South-West zonal interactive meeting and readiness assessment in Lagos on Monday, Amupitan warned INEC personnel that pressure on the commission ahead of the 2027 elections would be enormous. “The eyes of 200 million Nigerians, and the world, are fixed on us,” he said. DownloadInteractive Maps
The meeting, held at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Ikeja, marked the beginning of a six-zone tour by INEC to assess preparations for the elections. Amupitan said the initiative represented a departure from the traditional approach in which such preparations were handled largely by directorates at the commission’s headquarters.
He said the real test of INEC’s readiness would not take place in meeting rooms in Abuja but at local government areas, registration area centres and polling units across the country. The INEC chairman identified voter apathy, public distrust, misinformation and disinformation as major threats ahead of the elections.
He said the competence and conduct of INEC field officers would remain the commission’s “strongest defence against false narratives.” The commission is also refining its result management systems, including the recently introduced eEC8A, to improve verification of polling-unit results through the national collation centre.
Amupitan warned INEC personnel against partisan conduct and administrative negligence, citing Section 26 of the Electoral Act, which requires relevant electoral and security personnel to take an oath of neutrality. INEC said the South-West engagement would focus on logistics, technology, security, voter education, recruitment and stakeholder engagement as preparations for the 2027 general elections intensify.