Members of the House of Representatives are reported to be mulling an amendment to the electoral law that will alter the pattern of elections in this country from the staggered mode to a unified mode, whereby all elections will hold on a single day. There are five polls in the general election cycle – three at the national level namely into the Presidency, Senate and House of Representatives, and two at the state level into the governorships and state houses of assembly. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) also conducts elections into area councils of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) in line with the tenure of those councils.
Until now, the national elections were held on a day and the state elections on another day some fortnight later. Under the amendment being sought, all the elections will hold simultaneously on the same day. The proposal is contained in “A bill for an Act to repeal the Electoral Act No. 13, 2022 and to enact the Electoral Act 2025 to regulate the conduct of Federal, State and Area Councils in the Federal Capital Territory elections and for related matters,” which has scaled second reading in the green chamber. Sponsored by the chairman of the House Committee on Electoral Matters, Bayo Balogun (APC, Lagos), the bill has a slew of other proposals that will alter parameters of the legal framework as presently obtained.
Section 27 of the proposed amendment prescribes that elections at all levels be held not earlier than 210 days and not later than 30 days before the expiration of the tenure of occupants of an office, adding that “where a vacancy occurs in any of the houses mentioned in sub-section (1) more than 90 days before the date of the general election, an election shall be held to fill such vacancy not later than 30 days after the occurrence of the vacancy.” The 2022 Electoral Act in subsection (1) of Section 28 mandates INEC to publish notice of election 360 days before the conduct of an election, and in subsection (3) stipulates that in the case of a by-election, the notice is to be published not later than 14 days before the date appointed for the election. The proposed amendment provides that “without prejudice to subsections (1) and (3) above, apart from off- cycle elections, all the elections shall hold the same day.”
If the proposed amendment to the Electoral Act gets enacted into law, it should oblige INEC to conduct unified general elections rather than the two-tiered polls it conducted hitherto. The 1999 Constitution in sections 76 (1), 116 (1), 132 (1) and 178 (1) stipulates that elections to the two National Assembly chambers, state houses of assembly, offices of the President and state governors “shall be held on a date to be appointed by the Independent National Electoral Commission.” But the 2010 alteration to all those sections inserted “in accordance with the Electoral Act” immediately after the word “commission,” thereby tying INEC’s exercise of its constitutional prerogative of appointing dates for elections to provisions of the Electoral Act. This should make the proposed amendment in the Act binding on the electoral body.
Opinions differ, of course, on the desirability of adopting the one-day model. Some political actors considered it welcome because of its potential to drastically cut the cost of elections and eliminate the typical ‘bandwagon effect’ of national elections outcomes on state polls conducted in their aftermath. But others argued that single day elections could unduly overwhelm INEC, impair its operational efficiency and allow greater opportunities for rigging by electoral desperados. This would be besides that voters themselves could get confused by the multiplicity of choices they would have to make in all the elections that would confront them. It makes it even less appealing that lawmakers are considering the change for the 2027 general election when all stakeholders would have had little time to adjust to the new pattern.
Both sides have valid points. But first, let’s get what the proposed model is not. Some people voiced the fear that the proposal could take away INEC’s statutory power to fix dates of elections. That isn’t true. It shouldn’t be taking away the electoral commission’s power to appoint dates for elections because INEC will yet schedule polls within the time frame set in the law even if they hold on a single day.
Next, a dispassionate analysis of implications of the single day election model. By the way, the model is a global best practice adopted by countries like the United States, Sweden, Belgium and Germany, even Ghana and Sierra Leone in our own sub-region. The model is presently being vigorously canvassed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India – the world’s largest democracy that is typically in perpetual election mode by virtue of its federalised structure and staggered elections involving nearly a billion eligible voters. Many of these countries run successful electoral systems that recommend the model.
The biggest argument for holding simultaneous elections is cutting election costs, both on the part of the election body and the political actors. For the current staggered model, INEC engages poll workers twice for its 176,846 polling units nationwide and pays them; so also it renders material support to security operatives involved in the poll twice. Even before election day, expenses are duplicated. The electoral commission warehouses sensitive materials for a particular election year twice at the Central Bank on Nigeria at substantial costs, and it operates its Registration Area Centres (RACs) for onward deployment to the polling units twice. Meaning associated logistics are laid out and funded twice. Little wonder the commission had a N355billion budget for the 2023 general election, and it’s likely that wasn’t just all the money spent.
Same scenario applies to the political actors who have to engage with processes of the general election twice, including posting agents at the polling units and collation centres. Inability to pay the way compels most parties to go without representation at critical junctures of the electoral process where their interest could be shortchanged. Election observation missions too deploy their personnel twice, with those from outside the country forced to quarter those agents in hotels for the two-week interval between the national and state polls.
INEC may need to speak for itself about the fear it could be overwhelmed with all elections holding on a single day. But it seems commonsensical enough that the argument about system overload and possible collapse is unfounded, since the electoral body wouldn’t be doing anything extra beyond what it presently does pertaining to election day other than add on the ballot papers and boxes for state elections to those of national elections. Electoral bodies in other climes made the switch successfully in recent history. Indonesia, the world’s third largest democracy, held the largest single-day election anywhere on the planet in April 2019 when the country, for the first time since its transition to democracy, gave more than 192 million registered voters an opportunity to select a new president and Legislators at national and provincial levels at the same time. Previously, the two elections were held three months apart. With an average of 300 voters per polling station, each voter was issued five ballots and voting closed at about 1:00p.m., though ballot sorting and counting continued late into the night. The country repeated the feat in February 2024 without the system collapsing on the General Election Commission of Indonesia (KPU). There is no reason it should collapse on INEC.
Some people argued that holding the general election on one day would leave the electoral commission idle for four years in-between the election cycle. But that is evidently non-sequitur, because the difference to the present system is only to eliminate the fortnight interval between the national and state elections. INEC presently conducts electoral activities nearly all-year round owing to many elections and by-elections that fall outside the election cycle. Those off-cycle polls will yet be there even if the general election were to hold on a single day.
The elephant in the room is the average voter’s adaptability to make enlightened choices in all of the elections that will confront him/her on one day. But that is where intensive voter education comes in – not only by the electoral body but also other stakeholders like the political parties. Mob parades at mass rallies do not serve the end of voter education. Political parties and their candidates would need to calibrate messages about their aims in power in ways that voters would clear-headedly see the merit and make enlightened choices and not ride on primordial adrenalin.
It should be obvious that such culture isn’t fully cultivable between now and the 2027 poll. That is what makes the timeline proposed in the Reps’ amendment unrealistic. The change should rather be targeted at the 2031 general election.
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