Nigeria Voter Register Tops 103 Million Ahead of 2027 Elections

Nigeria's Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) announced that the National Register of Voters now exceeds 103 million following the completion of a three-phase Continuous Voter Registration exercise. The register stands at 103,428,715, comprising 53.5 million male and 49.9 million female voters, according to Chairman Prof. Joash Amupitan.

The registration drive, conducted between August 2025 and July 2026, added 10,772,421 new voters. Phase one registered 2.6 million, phase two 4.1 million, and phase three 3.9 million. INEC has acquired 57,000 new Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) devices for the polls.

“No political office in this country is worth the blood of a single Nigerian.”

Nationwide collection of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) begins October 9, alongside a seven-day display of the preliminary register for claims and objections. The exercise runs until October 15 at Registration Area centres, with Plateau State deploying across all 207 centres.

Amupitan warned politicians that their ambitions are "not worth the blood of Nigerians," vowing arrests and prosecution for violence, hate speech, and vote-buying. He cited recent incidents of an NDC candidate campaigning with a gun in Kano and threats against commission staff. INEC has activated an early-warning tracking framework through the Inter-Agency Consultative Committee on Election Security (ICCES).

The commission will deploy joint financial monitoring teams with the EFCC, ICPC, and NFIU to track illegal campaign spending. INEC says it has completed eight of 14 major statutory activities on its election timetable as the presidential election approaches on January 16, 2027.