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The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Nigeria (CBCN) has urged the National Assembly to urgently revisit electoral reforms, particularly the mandatory real-time transmission of election results.
The call was made on Sunday by the Archbishop of Owerri and outgoing CBCN President, Lucius Ugorji, during the opening session of the 2026 first plenary meeting at the Catholic Secretariat of Nigeria in Abuja. Speaking on the theme, “The Common Good and Leadership in Nigeria,” Ugorji expressed concern over declining voter participation in the country.
He noted that voter turnout had fallen sharply over the years, from 69 percent in 2003 to a historic low of 23 percent in 2023. “This decline says a lot about citizens’ trust in the electoral process and calls into question the legitimacy of elected officials in a democratic dispensation with the mandate of an ever-decreasing minority,” he said.
To reverse this worrying trend, Ugorji called on lawmakers to amend the Electoral Act to clearly mandate the real-time transmission of results from the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) at polling units directly to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s Result Viewing (IReV) portal. He stressed that such a measure is necessary to “prevent any human tampering with the expressed will of the electorate.”
The cleric also criticised what he described as inconsistencies in legislative priorities. While acknowledging the passage of the 2025 Tax Act, which mandates digital filing and record-keeping, he suggested that similar digital transparency is being neglected in the electoral process.
“The honourable members of the NASS should not allow themselves to be perceived as talking out of both sides of the mouth. The world is watching! Above all, God is also watching,” Ugorji warned.
Beyond electoral issues, he expressed concern over rising insecurity, describing recent killings in parts of the country, including Kwara State, as “senseless massacres.” He also highlighted the economic impact of illegal mining, which he said costs Nigeria an estimated nine billion dollars annually.
In his remarks at the event, former Director-General of the National Orientation Agency and chairman of the occasion, Mike Omeri, urged political leaders to adopt a model of “servant leadership” to bridge the widening gap between the rich and the poor and promote the common good.
