In what appears to be a brazen display of electoral malpractice that reeks of desperation, Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has once again exposed its partisan underbelly, shamelessly tilting the scales in favor of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his All Progressives Congress (APC). The latest Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) figures, released amid mounting suspicions, paint a picture of blatant manipulation: Osun State, a South West stronghold, miraculously registered over 393,000 new voters in a single week, while Kano State—Nigeria’s most populous state with over 15 million people—barely managed 10,166.
Let’s be frank: these numbers are statistically absurd and scream of foul play. Osun, with a population of 4.7 million, suddenly produces more new voters in one week than Kano, Katsina, Kaduna, Sokoto, Kebbi, Jigawa, and Zamfara combined could muster in the same period. The entire North West zone, with its nearly 50 million people, recorded 145,490 registrations—less than half of what Osun alone produced.
Here’s the full breakdown of the first week (August 18–24, 2025) CVR registrations:
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South West – 833,846
- Osun: 393,269
- Lagos: 222,035
- Ogun: 85,476
- Ondo: 64,620
- Oyo: 54,877
- Ekiti: 13,569
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North West – 145,490
- Kano: 10,166
- Katsina: 13,486
- Kaduna: 25,343
- Kebbi: 13,728
- Sokoto: 15,607
- Jigawa: 26,278
- Zamfara: 40,882
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South South – 145,455
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North Central – 121,524
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North East – 70,621
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South East – 62,406
🔹 National Total: 1,379,342
The regional imbalance is glaring. The South West alone accounted for over 60% of the entire national figure, dwarfing other regions. Osun State by itself contributed 28% of all new registrations, while the whole of Kano—a state with more than triple Osun’s population—barely scraped 0.7%.
Opposition parties are crying foul. The African Democratic Congress (ADC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have described the figures as “statistically implausible” and “pre-rigging.” They accuse INEC of inflating voter rolls in Tinubu’s backyard while suppressing registrations in other regions. For context, Osun’s one-week surge outstrips what it registered in an entire four-year cycle (2019–2023), when it added just 275,815 new voters.
This isn’t incompetence; it’s complicity. INEC, under Mahmood Yakubu, has become synonymous with controversy—from the glitch-ridden 2023 elections that cemented Tinubu’s disputed victory, to this CVR scandal. The APC’s silence speaks volumes. With mounting discontent in the North over insecurity, poverty, and rising food prices, the ruling party appears desperate to manufacture a demographic stronghold in the South West.
Meanwhile, Kano’s meagre 10,166 new registrations are nothing short of an insult to the state’s political weight. This is a state that delivered millions of votes in past elections, yet INEC’s figures now reduce it to a statistical footnote. Questions abound: Why is Osun suddenly enjoying this miracle surge? Are bots or ghost entries being used to flood INEC’s online portal? Why are traditional APC strongholds in the North being sidelined?
INEC’s excuses about “greater online awareness” in Osun are an insult to Nigerians’ intelligence. If the Commission has nothing to hide, it must allow an independent forensic audit of the CVR portal. Anything less confirms suspicions that democracy is being rigged long before ballots are cast.
Below is the complete state-by-state breakdown of online pre-registrations during the first week of INEC’s Continuous Voter Registration (August 18–24, 2025), grouped by geopolitical zones:
South-West (Total: 848,359 registrations)
Osun: 393,269
Lagos: 222,205
Ogun: 132,823
Oyo: 66,951
Ekiti: 29,685
Ondo: 3,426
South-South (Total: 169,377 registrations)
Delta: 24,421
Akwa Ibom: 12,373
Rivers: 11,314
Bayelsa: 4,638
Cross River: 4,055
Edo: 2,875
(Note: Total derived from individual state numbers in context)
South-East (Total: 64,696 registrations)
Anambra: 62,698
Abia: 772
Ebonyi: 261
Enugu: 484
Imo: 481
North-West (Total: 141,439 registrations)
Kaduna: 61,592
Kebbi: 35,009
Kano: 10,166
Katsina: 11,004
Sokoto: 12,478
Jigawa: 8,243
Zamfara: 2,947
North-Central (Total: 250,218 registrations)
FCT: 107,682
Kogi: 58,546
Kwara: 33,726
Niger: 24,818
Nasarawa: 11,555
Benue: 7,305
Plateau: 6,586
North-East (Total: 77,652 registrations)
Yobe: 34,888
Borno: 21,045
Bauchi: 13,066
Adamawa: 2,155
Taraba: 2,395
Gombe: 4,103
Summary Table
Geopolitical Zone Total Registrations
South-West 848,359
North-Central 250,218
South-South 169,377
North-West 141,439
North-East 77,652
South-East 64,696
National Total 1,379,342
This CVR debacle demands urgent action: suspension of the exercise until safeguards are put in place, accountability for officials complicit in this sham, and protection of the franchise for all Nigerians—not just Tinubu’s South West base.
If INEC and the APC think they can steal 2027 in broad daylight, they underestimate the anger of a nation betrayed once too often. The manipulation is too glaring, the injustice too sharp. Nigeria deserves better than a democracy reduced to a digital fraud factory.