PRESS STATEMENT
October 10, 2025
Appointment of New INEC Chairman: GRACO Congratulates Professor Joash Amupitan, Commends Council of State
• Calls for Bold, Urgent and Decisive Reforms Ahead of 2027 Polls
Grassroots Center for Rights & Civic Orientation (GRACO) extends its warm congratulations and best wishes to Professor Joash Ojo Amupitan on his appointment by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in consultation with the National Council of State to the position of Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). This call to national service at a critical juncture in Nigeria’s march towards attaining the status of true democratic state, is a huge responsibility. To effectively lead Nigeria’s Electoral Management Body (EMB) requires courage, integrity and a resolve to consolidate on progress achieved, while decisively confronting anomalies, which have undermined free, fair, transparent and credible polls in Nigeria.
From his profile as an academic, a legal luminary, and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), GRACO believes Professor Amupitan’s appointment ticks the boxes in terms of the constitutional quality of “unquestionable integrity,” and the non-partisanship inferred in the Third Schedule, Part I (F), Section 14 (1) of the 1999 Constitution as amended. GRACO commends the National Council of State chaired by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for sticking with convention by not appointing an INEC Chairman from his South West geo-political zone. As the presumptive candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) for the 2027 Presidential election, nominating the INEC Chairman from his geo-political zone would have eroded confidence and ingrained perceptions of partiality, partisanship and credibility-deficit.
However, commendable as Professor Amupitan’s appointment appears to be, there remain urgent legal, attitudinal and systemic issues dogging Nigeria’s electoral process, which require quick attention through reform. GRACO is convinced that critical as the role of the INEC Chairman is as Chief Electoral Commissioner of the federation, if these broader issues are not addressed through a bold and comprehensive reform effort, Nigeria’s march towards the realisation of the status of a genuinely democratic country in which the votes of the electorate count, and political accountability is entrenched, would remain a mirage. In this respect, Professor Amupitan alongside his National Commissioners, and INEC staff, working with other stakeholders in the electoral process have their work cut. GRACO believes that the very first step towards deepening trust in the electoral process is to insulate INEC from the direct political and appointive exposure of the executive arm of the government. The process of selecting the Chairman of the Commission should be tweaked from total presidential control by expanding it to ensure active participation of civil society, and the judicial branch through the National Judicial Council as recommended in the Uwais Report.
In a similar vein, GRACO believes there should be constitutional amendment, specifically focusing on Section 153(f), which categorises INEC as one of the “executive bodies” of the federation. After insulating INEC from direct presidential control, the next pressing issue is to tackle the logistics and administrative gaps, which undermine the Commission’s capacity to deliver electoral materials, and implement reverse logistics in a timely manner. Added to this is the need to shore up the functionality of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and the INEC Result View Portal. These technologies should no longer succumb to glitches because every failure erodes trust and confidence of the electorate. GRACO equally calls upon the new INEC Chairman to explore reforms, which will remove barriers to robust citizens participation in elections. We believe the process of printing and collecting Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) is quite cumbersome. For voters in far flung rural areas, the cost of commuting to INEC offices in Local Government Areas (LGAs) is quite prohibitive, especially during this period of economic crisis when extreme poverty stalks the country. To solve this problem and to cut the cost of printing PVCs, which end up not being collected, the use of the Voter Identification Numbers (VIN) should serve in the accreditation and voting process.
Also important for the reform agenda is the need to address the chaos and opaqueness, which characterises current results collation process. Issues such as non-usage of the BVAS, over voting and violence at polling units have in past elections led to cancellation of entire polling units. What this implies is that a desperate politician can simply orchestrate violence, overvoting and non-use of BVAS in an opponent’s stronghold in other to get votes in such areas cancelled, thereby disenfranchising voters. INEC needs to look critically at this among many other issues. Nonetheless, GRACO believes the Commission, even in the context of the extant Electoral Act, has certain powers, which it has failed to use in correcting some glaring infractions in our electoral process. Particularly, Section 65 of the Electoral Act, 2022, which gives the Commission the powers to “review the declaration and return where the Commission determines that the said declaration and return was not made voluntarily or was made contrary to the provisions of the law, regulations and guidelines, and manual for the election.” While wishing Professor Amupitan an impactful tenure in office, GRACO makes no mistake about the fact that the expectations of citizens are quite high. These expectations will shape the assessment of the off-cycle elections in Anambra in November, Ekiti in June, Osun in August 2026, and ultimately, the 2027 general elections. The ball is now in the court of the nation’s Chief Electoral Commissioner to ensure he hits the ground running after confirmation by the Senate. GRACO urges that the high hopes of citizens for credible, transparent, free, and fair elections must not be dashed.
Signed:
Armsfree Ajanaku
Executive Director, GRACO