INEC Chairman Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, a former presidential aspirant of the All Progressives Congress, has been challenged to explain why 240 polling units were dropped just one year after the commission created 56,872 new ones. Chief Charles Udeogaranya, also of the APC, issued the challenge in a statement released in Abuja on Thursday, urging the electoral body to stop being “economical with details” that should be in the public domain for the sake of transparency and credibility.
Udeogaranya’s suspicion follows an INEC report that identified 240 out of the 176,846 polling units nationwide where elections would not take place on February 25 and March 11. Speaking at a meeting with the chairmen of the 18 registered political parties, Yakubu explained that his staff had discovered those polling units had no registered voters. The commission had previously added 56,872 polling units in June 2022 as part of a voter‑access expansion drive— the first large‑scale increase since 1996, when the existing 119,974 units were created.
The politician argued that the commission was not fully disclosing information about its decision to drop the affected polling centres. He urged INEC to release complete details of all the new polling units for public scrutiny and verification. According to Udeogaranya, the discarded 240 units are insignificant compared with the over 56,000 newly created ones. He said Nigerians need to know how those units were populated, who the voters are, and to assess the copies of their registers and permanent voter card collection records for a fuller public interrogation.
The APC stalwart suggested that the announcement of the 240 affected units was a diversion intended to give the impression of due diligence and thoroughness. He concluded that if INEC wants Nigerians and the international community to accept its promise of a free, fair, and credible poll, it must provide comprehensive details of the 2023 general election.
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