Abuja — August 29, 2026. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is once again facing questions over the security, reliability and transparency of its digital election infrastructure following revelations by technology professional Martin Uwakwe, who says he identified vulnerabilities in the Commission’s Results Viewing Portal (IReV).
Uwakwe said he privately alerted INEC about the vulnerabilities and subsequently received a detailed response from the Commission’s Director of ICT explaining measures being taken to address them.
But he is demanding something more: public accountability and transparency.
His concerns have assumed greater significance because they come less than a year before the 2027 general elections, when Nigerians will once again depend heavily on technology, particularly BVAS and IReV, to strengthen confidence in the electoral process.
The unanswered questions from 2023
The latest controversy inevitably brings back memories of the dramatic failure of IReV during the February 25, 2023 presidential election.
INEC had promoted electronic uploading of polling-unit result sheets as a major safeguard against manipulation and as an important tool for transparency. However, on election night, presidential result sheets were not being uploaded to IReV as expected.
INEC initially described the problem as a technical hitch arising from scaling up IReV from its previous use in off-season elections to a nationwide election. In its later post-election review, the Commission provided a more detailed explanation, saying the presidential result-upload process encountered an unexpected database configuration problem because the presidential election was treated as a single nationwide constituency, unlike senatorial and federal constituency elections that were mapped to individual states. The system consequently returned HTTP server errors. �
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INEC said it eventually deployed software “hotfixes” and that the first presidential result sheet was successfully uploaded at 8:55 p.m. on February 25, 2023. It further said that the enormous backlog subsequently created heavy traffic, slowing the system even after the immediate error had been addressed. �
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But that explanation did not end the controversy.
The “switched-off server” allegation
During the 2023 election crisis, opposition political actors went considerably further, alleging that the failure was not merely a technical malfunction.
In a statement issued after the election, the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) alleged that INEC had “literally closed the IReV server” after only a small number of polling-unit results had been uploaded. The party alleged that the action effectively undermined real-time electronic transmission and opened the door to manipulation during the subsequent manual collation process. �
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That allegation, however, has never been established as fact by the evidence cited here.
Indeed, INEC has consistently rejected the suggestion that the IReV problem was caused by sabotage or an intentional shutdown. In its February 26, 2023 statement, the Commission said the portal was experiencing technical problems related to scaling the system for a nationwide election and assured Nigerians that the system remained secure. �
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The distinction is crucial.
There is evidence that IReV experienced a serious failure in 2023. There are allegations that the system was deliberately shut down. But the available evidence does not establish that INEC intentionally switched off the server.
Why the distinction matters in 2026
Three years later, the controversy remains relevant because the central question has changed from “Did IReV fail?” to:
“Can Nigerians independently verify that the technology underpinning the 2027 election is secure, resilient and protected against both technical failure and deliberate interference?”
That question becomes even more urgent following Uwakwe’s disclosure of an alleged vulnerability in the current IReV architecture.
It is also significant that INEC’s own 2023 review acknowledged the need for greater resilience and additional testing of the IReV system after the election-day failure. �
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Then came the casino-content discovery
Adding another layer to the concerns is the discovery of casino and gambling-related material on INEC’s official website.
Uwakwe has specifically clarified that the casino material was not the vulnerability he originally reported. According to his account, he discovered the casino links only after publicly complaining that INEC had failed to respond to his earlier communication concerning IReV.
That means Nigeria may be dealing with two distinct cybersecurity questions:
An undisclosed vulnerability allegedly identified in IReV.
The unexplained appearance of gambling-related content on INEC’s official website.
The second issue raises questions about website administration, access privileges, credential management and the security of third-party systems connected to INEC’s digital infrastructure.
What Nigerians should demand from INEC
The Commission should not merely assure Nigerians that everything is under control.
It should provide a credible, independently verifiable account of the measures being taken.
Among the questions requiring answers are:
Who has administrative access to IReV and INEC’s public-facing websites?
Have all former staff, contractors and vendors had their credentials revoked?
Has INEC conducted an independent penetration test of IReV?
Has the vulnerability reported by Uwakwe been independently verified and closed?
Are complete access and server logs being preserved for forensic examination?
What safeguards prevent an administrator or compromised account from altering, suppressing or delaying election-result uploads?
And perhaps most importantly:
What independent mechanism will allow Nigerians to determine whether an IReV failure in 2027 is a genuine technical incident—or something more deliberate?
The 2027 test
INEC has an opportunity to confront these questions before the next election rather than after it.
The lesson from 2023 is that simply saying “there was a technical glitch” is unlikely to satisfy a public that increasingly expects election technology to be transparent and auditable.
The Commission must therefore demonstrate that its systems are not only functional but secure, independently tested, resilient and accountable.
Because in 2027, Nigerians will not only be watching the polling units.
They will be watching IReV.
And they will remember what happened in 2023.
