Voter database leak: Atiku demands answers from INEC

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has called for a comprehensive investigation into allegations of a voter database leak from Nigeria's Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), asserting that the electoral body's recent explanation has only deepened concerns.

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INEC’s statement has moved this issue beyond conjecture. The Commission has now confirmed that voter information was accessed through credentials assigned to personnel participating in the ongoing CVR exercise and that such information was released without authority.

Abubakar stated that INEC's admission that voter information was accessed using valid official credentials and then released without authorization shifts the focus from external hacking to internal compromise and potential political interference. He questioned how information stored in a restricted electoral database ended up in the public domain.

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What Nigerians want to know is simple: how did information that resides within a restricted electoral database find its way into the hands of political actors and their associates?

"INEC’s statement has moved this issue beyond conjecture," Abubakar said through his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu. "The Commission has now confirmed that voter information was accessed through credentials assigned to personnel participating in the ongoing CVR exercise and that such information was released without authority."

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The fact that there was no external hack does not diminish the gravity of the incident. If anything, it raises even more troubling questions about internal controls, institutional safeguards, and the possibility of political interference.

He argued that the absence of an external cyberattack does not diminish the seriousness of the incident. "If anything, it raises even more troubling questions about internal controls, institutional safeguards, and the possibility of political interference," Abubakar added. The former vice president pointed to the public release of the information by Lere Olayinka, spokesman for the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, as a key factor in the controversy. Abubakar stressed that Nigerians are entitled to know how sensitive voter data moved from INEC's internal system into the possession of political associates.

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What makes this entire episode impossible to ignore is that the information in question did not emerge from a whistleblower, an investigative journalist, or an anti-corruption agency. It was publicly released by Mr Lere Olayinka, spokesman to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike.