1.6 million invalid voters: INEC removes names, to prosecute 54 culprits

BY BONNY AMADI

The Nigerian, electoral body, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) says it has removed 1,608,660 invalid voter registrations.

Speaking at a press briefing in Abuja on Monday, Joash Amupitan, INEC chairman, said the invalid registrations were identified through a review conducted using the automated biometric identification system (ABIS) for the 2025 and 2026 continuous voter registration (CVR) exercise.

In October, the commission faced backlash after Nigerians flagged duplicate entries, artificial intelligence-generated photos, and names of deceased persons on the voter register.

Amupitan said the commission also removed 873 records belonging to verified deceased persons, bringing the total number of records deleted from the register to 1,609,553.

He said the commission had concluded the cleaning exercise following complaints, claims, and objections received during the display of the preliminary register at registration wards between October 9 and 15, 2026, and its subsequent online publication.

“The commission harvested 11,088,238 records from the three phases of the 2025/2026 continuous voter registration (CVR) exercise. Of these, ABIS initially flagged 1,545,052 for examination,” Amupitan said.

“A flagged record is not necessarily an invalid registration: automated screening identifies matters requiring review, while authorised adjudication determines the outcome. Consequently, before publication of the preliminary register, 1,277,052 registrations had been confirmed invalid and excluded from the 1,545,052 for examination.

“As a result of objections, claims and complaints received during the display and publication, a further 268,000 cases underwent adjudication. A total of 217,722 were confirmed invalid and removed, while 50,278 were cleared as valid and retained.

“Additional screening subsequently identified 113,886 further invalid registrations, which were also removed. The cumulative total of confirmed invalid registrations removed after the objections, claims and complaints is 331,608, in addition to the 873 separately verified deceased voters’ records. This brings the total clean-up to 1,608,660.

“The commission confirms that the current register-cleaning exercise for the 2025/2026 continuous voter registration (CVR) has been concluded.

“All 1,608,660 confirmed invalid registrations have been removed. In addition, 873 records belonging to verified deceased persons have also been removed as a separate category. The combined total of records removed under these two categories is 1,609,553.”