The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Joash Amupitan, has revealed that a review of Nigeria’s national voters’ register uncovered names of several deceased Nigerians, including prominent politicians, still listed as eligible voters.
Truthng reports that Amupitan made the disclosure on Wednesday during INEC’s first quarterly meeting with Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in Abuja, where he announced plans for a nationwide verification exercise to sanitise the register ahead of the 2027 general elections.
He said, “We discovered names of prominent Nigerian politicians who have died still on the register.
“That impacts the integrity of the register, and we have to do a clean-up because we don’t expect the dead to come from the grave to vote.”
The INEC Chairman raised the alarm while referencing the recently held Anambra off-cycle governorship election, where only a fraction of the 2.9 million registered voters participated.
He said, “When we look at the Voters Register for Anambra state during the off-cycle elections in November, we discovered that the number of registered voters stood at over 2.9 million, but only about 600,000 came out to vote.
“This is just about 20 percent of the registered voters. So, we decided to take another look at the register.”
Prof. Amupitan stated that the verification exercise would focus on identifying and removing ineligible names from the register, including deceased individuals and others no longer qualified to vote, to enhance public confidence in the electoral process.
He added that the commission was consulting stakeholders, including the National Population Commission (NPC) and other relevant bodies, to establish a credible mechanism for flagging and removing deceased voters.
Amupitan also disclosed that INEC has prepared the timetable for the 2027 elections, but is withholding its release pending ongoing amendments to the Electoral Act.
