Nasir El-Rufai, a former Kaduna State governor, has stated that if he had been in Nigeria, he would have taken part in the demonstration at the National Assembly spearheaded by Peter Obi, a former presidential candidate for the Labour Party.
Speaking from Egypt in an interview with Trust TV on Monday, El-Rufai made the statement while criticizing the Senate’s decision to change the proposed Electoral Act revisions’ provisions on the electronic transmission of election results.
“I regret that I have been unable to go back to Nigeria. “To restore the real-time and mandatory transmission of results from the polling unit, I would have joined Mr. Peter Obi and other party leaders in protesting to the National Assembly,” he stated.
The former governor asserts that lowering electoral manipulation and boosting public trust in elections depend on the electronic broadcast of results in real time.
He maintained that political factors were responsible for the reform’s hesitation and postponement.
Accusing the ruling party of opposing the proposal for what he called survival motives, he declared, “Adopting real-time electronic transmission will drastically reduce rigging and improve the credibility of our elections.”
El-Rufai added that although the Senate had not yet fully embraced the reform, the House of Representatives seemed more open to it.
The remarks came after Obi led a demonstration against the Senate’s decision to eliminate the word “real-time” from the Electoral Act Amendment Bill’s provisions on electronic results transmission on Monday at the National Assembly complex in Abuja.
Nigerian youths and pro-democracy organizations organized the protest, which they called Occupy the National Assembly. They claimed that the MPs’ conduct was intended to erode electoral openness in advance of the general elections in 2027.
The Electoral Act 2022 (Repeal and Re-enactment) Amendment Bill, 2026, was approved by the Senate on its third reading last week. Since then, there has been criticism about the removal of “real-time” from the pertinent portions; detractors have warned that the alteration may create opportunities for manipulation after the election.
Protesters stated that the removal of “real-time electronic transmission” compromises the integrity of the reform, notwithstanding the Senate’s later insistence that it did not outlaw electronic communication of findings.
