Politics
Finally INEC opens up on why IReV failed during 2023 presidential election
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By Emmanuel Agaji
Nigeria’s electoral body, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has finally explained why the result viewing portal (IReV) failed during the February 2023 presidential election.
The election was won by Bola Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party came second while Peter Obi of the Labour Party came third.
As reported by The Cable on Friday, the electoral umpire gave the explanation in a comprehensive post-mortem report on the 2023 general election released on the first anniversary of the election
The INEC report said the “HTTP error” its server returned during the presidential election was because of a configuration bug which was discovered after the presiding officers at the polling units could only upload the results of the National Assembly elections.
“In configuring and mapping the election results for the presidential and NASS elections,” the report sighted by The Cable reads, “the Commission created Four Hundred and Seventy (470) election types consisting of one presidential constituency covering the entire country, 109 Senatorial Districts and 360 Federal Constituencies.”
The report further noted, “Each Senatorial District and Federal Constituency election on the database was mapped to their respective States.”
It, however, noted that the presidential election result “is a single, countrywide constituency and therefore, does not belong to any one State.
“Consequently, while the uploads for the NASS elections succeeded as the application was able to identify the respective State and build the folder hierarchy for the results organization process for the election, attempts to upload the presidential election results sheets, which does not belong to or mapped to any State on the database, failed.
“Instead, it returned a HTTP server error response. This failure is attributable to the inability of the application to create and build a folder structure to organize the uploaded images of the result sheets of the presidential election.”
Narrating the IReV problem, the INEC in its report, said it was first reported at 4 pm on Election Day and was partially resolved in four hours.
The commission admitted that it was a key challenge that “impacted on the public perception” of the election and elicited “widespread commentary across the country”.
INEC said, “To begin with, it is important to note that the IReV portal is one of the most significant innovations introduced by the Commission prior to the 2023 General Election to promote the integrity and transparency of the electoral process. As a public-facing website, the IReV portal shows the images of the original Polling Unit result sheets as recorded in Form EC8A.
“The operational methodology and the concept behind the upload of results to the IReV for public viewing is quite simple. At the end of polls, Polling Unit results (Form EC8As) are scanned and uploaded to the IReV by the Presiding Officer(s). These results are then available for viewing to the public and all stakeholders.
“The system, which was first deployed during Nasarawa Central State Constituency bye-election in August 2020 and tested in 105 subsequent elections, including three (3) off-cycle governorship elections, has tremendously improved public confidence in the integrity and transparency of the Commission’s result management process.
“The challenge of uploading the PU presidential election results on the IReV after the presidential and NASS elections on 25th February 2023 was unique. As voting ended across the country and POs began the process of uploading the images of the PU result sheets of the elections for the various constituencies around 4:00pm, the Commission began to receive reports that attempts to upload presidential election result sheets was failing.
“Following these reports, the Commission immediately engaged with its field officials for details in order to understand, and trace the origin, source, scale and magnitude of the problem across the result management ecosystem to devise appropriate solutions.
“In the troubleshooting process, it was established that there was no issue in uploading the PU result sheets of the Senate and House of Representatives elections through the Election Result Modules. However, there was a problem with uploading the presidential election results to the system.
“Attempts to upload the results were generating internal server errors, which refer to a significant impairment that usually originate from within an application due to problems relating to configuration, permissions, or failure to create or access application resources correctly.
“Further interrogation of the Election Result Modules indicated that the system is encountering an unexpected configuration problem in mapping the presidential election results uploaded into the system to the participating Polling Units.
“Due to the complex, sensitive and critical nature of the systems and the real potential for malicious cyberattacks, the Commission immediately put in place several strict security and audit control measures to prevent any unfettered or elevated access to the Result Upload System.”
The commission said after identifying the source of the problem, it quickly created and deployed “hotfixes” — software updates for fixing a bug or any vulnerabilities in a system.
The deployed hotfixes eventually resolved the HTTP error on the system “and the first presidential election result sheet was successfully uploaded at 8.55 pm on the 25th of February 2023,” it said.
While rating itself high, INEC stated in the report.
“Yet, the 2023 General Election produced the most diverse outcome in recent Nigerian electoral history in terms of party representation in executive and legislative elections nationwide. Thus, four (4) political parties produced State Governors, seven (7) secured Senatorial seats, eight (8) won federal constituencies and nine (9) in State seats,” the report said.
In a rare political development that has sent shockwaves through Sokoto State, the Chairman of Tangaza Local Government Area, Isa Kalanjeni, has resigned from the All Progressives Congress (APC) and simultaneously stepped down from his elected position as council chairman.
The twin resignations were contained in two separate letters made available to journalists in Sokoto on Tuesday.
In a letter dated May 5, 2026, addressed to the APC Ward Chairman of Kalanjeni Ward in Tangaza Local Government, Kalanjeni announced his immediate departure from the ruling party.
I wish to formally inform you of my decision to resign from the APC with immediate effect. This decision is borne out of purely personal reasons. I appreciate the opportunity given to me to be part of the party.”
Resignation from Office
In a separate letter dated July 7, 2026, addressed to the Secretary to the Sokoto State Government and the Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Kalanjeni formally resigned as Executive Chairman of Tangaza Local Government Area with immediate effect.
Please accept this letter as formal notification that I am resigning from my position as Executive Chairman of Tangaza Local Government Area, effective immediately from today.”
Reasons Cited
The embattled chairman explained that the “difficult decision” followed extensive consultations with family, political associates, and community stakeholders.
He also cited administrative constraints, stating:
“Due to recent unavoidable administrative challenges, I find that I am no longer able to execute the responsibilities of this office to the high standard expected of me.”
Despite the abrupt exit, Kalanjeni expressed appreciation to the people of the council:
“I am incredibly grateful to the electorate, the council’s legislative arm, and the entire staff for the privilege and opportunity to serve our people. I wish the incoming leadership and administration continued success.”
The All Progressives Congress (APC) says it is on course to meet the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) July 11 deadline for the submission of its presidential and National Assembly candidates for the 2027 general elections.
A senior member of the party’s National Working Committee (NWC), who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the upload of candidates’ details was at an advanced stage, with the details of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his running mate expected to be uploaded by the middle of the week.
“We are progressing smoothly with the uploading of the details of our National Assembly candidates,” the source said.
“We hope that on or before next Wednesday, we shall upload the details of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his running mate. We are completely sure of meeting the July 11 deadline for uploading all our candidates on the INEC portal.”
Checks at the APC’s Information and Communications Technology (ICT) department at the Muhammadu Buhari House headquarters in Abuja on Sunday indicated that the party’s technical team has continued to interface with the INEC portal without disruption.
Sources in the department said the details of most principal officers of the 10th National Assembly and several serving lawmakers had already been uploaded.
They added that the details of four serving governors — AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq of Kwara State, Mai Mala Buni of Yobe State, Hope Uzodimma of Imo State and Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State — had also been uploaded to the INEC portal.
The race to meet the deadline followed a review of the party’s primary elections. The APC recently submitted a revised list of candidates to INEC after the NWC removed six senatorial and 19 House of Representatives candidates who had earlier emerged from the party’s May primaries.
The changes affected constituencies in Abia, Kogi, Taraba, Benue, Ebonyi, Ondo, Kaduna, Niger and Kwara states and followed the recommendations of the party’s Primary Election Appeal Committee.
The revised list was forwarded to INEC in a letter jointly signed by APC National Chairman, Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda, and National Secretary, Ajibola Basiru.
APC National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka, said the party received more than 700 petitions from aggrieved members after the conclusion of its primaries.
“The party received over 700 petitions from aggrieved members following the conclusion of our shadow elections,” Morka said.
He declined to state when the final list of candidates would be released publicly, saying the party’s immediate focus was to ensure compliance with INEC’s nomination requirements.
“Our absolute immediate priority right now is ensuring that our designated candidates properly complete and return their Form EC9 nomination documents for upload ahead of the strict INEC deadline, rather than focusing on the public release of the list,” he said.
Despite the changes made by the appeal committee, the final list submitted to INEC retained many of the party’s leading figures, including four serving governors who secured the party’s tickets to contest Senate seats in the 2027 general elections.
Lawmaker representing the Nasarawa South Senatorial District, Senator Mohammed Ogoshi Onawo, has officially resigned from the African Democratic Congress, ADC.
His resignation was contained in a letter dated July 2, 2026, and addressed to the ADC Ward Chairman in Galadimawa Ward, Doma Local Government Area of Nasarawa State.
The lawmaker attributed his decision to the party’s lingering internal crisis and protracted legal disputes at the national level.
In the letter sighted on Sunday by our correspondent, Onawo said his resignation takes effect from June 15, 2026.
The lawmaker said the persistent internal wrangling and legal battles within the party made it difficult for him to pursue the developmental mandate entrusted to him by the electorate.
“It is driven by my firm belief that the prevailing circumstances within the current party structure and the endless legal battles it is currently embroiled in no longer provide the cohesion, support, and enabling environment for me to focus squarely on effectively representing my constituents and to fully realise the developmental and progressive mandate they entrusted to me,” he said.
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