By Luminous Jannamike
ABUJA – The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has vowed to document, collate and share polling-unit results with the public during the 2027 general elections, despite a warning by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) against privately collated results.
The party said it would respect INEC’s exclusive power to declare official results and winners, but insisted that this did not stop political parties and citizens from independently gathering, verifying and sharing election figures.
In a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, the ADC said its position was based on its constitutional right to collect and share information.
“We are aware of our rights to freedom of expression under the Constitution. We are also aware of the limitations associated with those rights. And we hold that our rights to collate and share election results are not abrogated by any of the limitation clauses,” the party said.
The ADC said its polling agents would document results at polling units while its party structures would collate and verify the figures before making them public.
“The ADC will share our collated results with the public. Our agents will document results, our structures will collate them, and we will communicate verified figures to the public, clearly identifying their source and status,” the party said.
The party said acknowledging INEC’s statutory responsibility to declare election results did not mean that citizens or political parties had surrendered their right to independently collect and disseminate election information.
“Although we recognise INEC’s responsibility to make official declarations of results and to declare winners of elections, that responsibility cannot reasonably abrogate the right of citizens to collect and collate election results and to share them,” the ADC said.
The position comes after INEC Chairman, Professor Joash Amupitan, warned against the sharing of privately collated election results, reinforcing the commission’s position that official declarations remain its responsibility.
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