The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has accused former Minister of Transportation Rotimi Amaechi and other opposition figures of hypocrisy over the issue of electronic transmission of election results in the Electoral Act.
Speaking during a media chat on Monday, March 2, 2026, Wike reacted to the opposition’s rejection of the newly signed 2026 Electoral Act, particularly the provision allowing manual transmission of results where electronic transmission fails due to network issues.
Wike claimed that Amaechi and others in the Buhari administration actively opposed and persuaded former President Muhammadu Buhari against signing the electronic transmission clause.
“Remember under Buhari, the issue of electronic transmission came. People like Rotimi Amaechi, they were in government, they said ‘no, don’t sign, if you sign you lose election’,” Wike said.
“And this is the same person now who is coming out in the public to say there should be electronic transmission, but he refused simply because he felt his boss would be affected.”
He clarified that the new law does not ban electronic transmission but includes a safeguard to prevent disenfranchisement in areas with poor network coverage.
“Now we are here, they did not say there should not be electronic transmission. All they said is in case, and which is likely, let us not disenfranchise people by not allowing their votes to be counted,” he added.
Wike also defended the provision requiring political parties to conduct direct primaries, arguing that indirect primaries allow wealthy individuals — including governors and ministers — to dominate party structures.
He said the direct primary system would correct this imbalance and give ordinary party members greater influence.
Wike described Nigerians as “professional complainants,” noting that the same people who previously criticised indirect primaries for concentrating power in the hands of party elites and moneybags are now opposing direct primaries.
Last week, opposition parties including the African Democratic Congress (ADC) and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) called on the National Assembly to immediately begin a fresh amendment process to remove what they described as “obnoxious” and “anti-democratic” provisions in the Electoral Act 2026.
They argued that the law, signed by President Bola Tinubu, could undermine electoral transparency and erode public confidence in the voting system.
