Atiku Calls for Independent Investigation Into Unauthorised Release of Emeka Ike’s Voter Details

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has called for an independent and transparent investigation into the unauthorised release of the voter registration details of Nollywood actor Emeka Ike, following a controversy that began when a media aide to the FCT minister shared screenshots of the actor’s voter information on social media. 

In a statement issued on Tuesday by his senior special assistant on public communication, Phrank Shaibu, Atiku said that although the Independent National Electoral Commission has admitted that sensitive voter information was released without authorisation, the commission has failed to provide answers to some questions. He stated that INEC must be able to explain how sensitive voter information in its custody finds its way into the hands of a political actor, and that the electoral umpire must go beyond publishing press statements to providing full findings of the investigation for transparency purposes.

Atiku noted that INEC’s statement has moved the issue beyond conjecture, with the commission confirming that voter information was accessed through credentials assigned to personnel participating in the ongoing continuous voter registration exercise and that such information was released without authority. 

He said that admission alone should concern every Nigerian, and that Nigerians want to know how information that resides within a restricted electoral database found its way into the hands of political actors and their associates. He argued that the fact that there was no external hack does not diminish the gravity of the incident, but rather raises even more troubling questions about internal controls, institutional safeguards, and the possibility of political interference.

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The former vice president said the Nigerian people deserve to know the complete chain of custody, including who accessed the information, who requested it, who received it, how it left INEC’s custody, and why the trail led directly to political actors associated with a serving minister who has repeatedly made unusually confident pronouncements about the outcome of a future election. INEC had earlier dismissed claims of a major breach or external hacking of its database, attributing the unauthorised disclosure to the misuse of valid internal credentials by authorised personnel.