INEC's reported 103,428,715-voter register is 9,959,707 above its own 2023 table and 812,714 short of 2023 plus 10,772,421 new registrations

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) says Nigeria's register of voters for the 2027 general election now holds 103,428,715 people. Its Chairman, Professor Joash Amupitan, gave the figure at a stakeholders meeting and press conference in Abuja on Tuesday, 6 October 2026, as reported by The Punch and Channels Television. He said the total followed the three-phase Continuous Voter Registration (CVR) exercise and a biometric clean-up of the register. No INEC text of the address or state table had been posted on inecnigeria.org when this report was prepared, so the new figures below are as reported, not as read in an INEC document.

Vero Record set the reported figures against the register INEC used for the 2023 general election. That document, 'Registered Voters & PVCs Collected for the 2023 General Election', is a six-page INEC PDF with a state-by-state summary table dated as at 5 February 2023. It gives a national total of 93,469,008 registered voters, and its 37 state and FCT rows add to exactly that number.

On that baseline the reported 2027 register is 9,959,707 larger than the 2023 one (103,428,715 minus 93,469,008), a rise of 10.66 per cent. The press reports also quote the Chairman as saying the three phases of the CVR produced 10,772,421 new registrations before the clean-up. Added to the 2023 total, that would give 104,241,429. The reported final figure is 812,714 lower. That is the net reduction the two reported numbers imply; the gross number of records removed could be larger or smaller, because the arithmetic cannot separate deletions from other changes made to the register since 2023.

The comparison supports INEC on one point. In his address to political parties on 5 February 2026, published on inecnigeria.org, Professor Amupitan said the Commission had registered 2,782,587 eligible voters in the first phase and warned that 'INEC will not hesitate to remove offenders from the voters' register.' A net reduction of about 800,000 between the gross count and the final register is consistent with that stated intention. The reported figures do not say how many of the removed records were duplicates, deceased voters or invalid registrations.

The new-registration figure itself has moved. In July and August, outlets reporting INEC figures gave 10,399,288 completed registrations for the three phases; the Chairman's reported figure on Tuesday is 10,772,421, which is 373,133 higher. Using the earlier figure, the implied net reduction would be 439,581 (93,469,008 plus 10,399,288 is 103,868,296, less 103,428,715). Neither total has been found in a published INEC document.

At state level, the 2023 table gives Lagos 7,060,195 registered voters, Kano 5,921,370 and Kaduna 4,335,208. The figures reported on Tuesday are Lagos 7,488,633, Kano 6,570,276 and Kaduna 4,662,640. Lagos is up 428,438, or 6.07 per cent; Kano is up 648,906, or 10.96 per cent; Kaduna is up 327,432, or 7.55 per cent. Together the three states grew by 1,404,776.

Kano therefore grew slightly faster than the national register (10.96 against 10.66 per cent), while Lagos and Kaduna grew more slowly. The order at the top is unchanged from 2023, when Lagos, Kano and Kaduna were also the three largest in INEC's table. Lagos also had the most uncollected voter cards in 2023, 845,225, or 12.0 per cent of its register.

One reported state figure stands out against the 2023 table. INEC's 2023 document gives Ondo 1,991,344 registered voters. The Chairman was reported as placing Ondo fourth from the bottom in 2027 with 1,733,641, which would be 257,703 fewer, a fall of 12.94 per cent, while every other state named in the report grew. Vero Record could not establish whether this is a real reduction after the clean-up or an error in transcription, and it should be checked against INEC's own table once published.

The 2023 document has a small inconsistency of its own. In the Ondo row, collected cards (1,729,641) and uncollected cards (261,981) add to 1,991,622, which is 278 more than the registered figure printed beside them. The Lagos, Kano and Kaduna rows add up exactly: 6,214,970 plus 845,225 is 7,060,195; 5,594,193 plus 327,177 is 5,921,370; 4,164,473 plus 170,735 is 4,335,208.

The reported breakdown of the new register is consistent on sex: 53,528,218 men and 49,900,497 women add to 103,428,715. The four reported age bands (43,265,946; 29,777,576; 22,982,900; 7,402,291) add to 103,428,713, two fewer than the total, which may be a slip in transcription.

INEC has announced that collection of newly issued Permanent Voter Cards will begin on 9 October 2026. Until it posts the state table and the clean-up figures, the 103,428,715 total and the state numbers rest on the Chairman's reported remarks, and the 812,714 net reduction is an inference from them, not an INEC count. INEC was not asked for comment for this report.

What this rests on

Grade A: INEC PDF 'Registered Voters & PVCs Collected for the 2023 General Election' (6 pages, state table on PDF page 2, as at 5 February 2023), downloaded from a Wayback Machine capture of inecnigeria.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/PVCs-Collected-Registered-Voters.pdf and parsed with pymupdf; INEC Chairman's remarks to political parties, 5 February 2026, section 11 (Wayback capture). Grade B: 2027 figures as reported by The Punch (Olugbenga Ige, 6 October 2026) and Channels Television; the 10,399,288 total as reported in July/August 2026. Arithmetic: 37 state rows of the 2023 table sum to 93,469,008. 103,428,715 - 93,469,008 = 9,959,707; 9,959,707 / 93,469,008 = 10.66%. 93,469,008 + 10,772,421 = 104,241,429; 104,241,429 - 103,428,715 = 812,714. 93,469,008 + 10,399,288 = 103,868,296; 103,868,296 - 103,428,715 = 439,581. 10,772,421 - 10,399,288 = 373,133. Lagos 7,488,633 - 7,060,195 = 428,438 (6.07%); Kano 6,570,276 - 5,921,370 = 648,906 (10.96%); Kaduna 4,662,640 - 4,335,208 = 327,432 (7.55%); 428,438 + 648,906 + 327,432 = 1,404,776. Ondo 1,733,641 - 1,991,344 = -257,703 (-12.94%). Row checks: 6,214,970 + 845,225 = 7,060,195; 5,594,193 + 327,177 = 5,921,370; 4,164,473 + 170,735 = 4,335,208; Ondo 1,729,641 + 261,981 = 1,991,622 (278 over). Sex 53,528,218 + 49,900,497 = 103,428,715; age 43,265,946 + 29,777,576 + 22,982,900 + 7,402,291 = 103,428,713.

What this does not establish

No INEC document for the 2027 total, the state figures, the 10,772,421 new registrations or the number of records removed was available; all are press-reported. The 812,714 figure is a net difference, not a count of deletions. Whether Ondo's register actually fell is not established. The 2023 table is dated as at 5 February 2023 and may differ from later INEC revisions (for example before the 2024 Ondo governorship election). Nothing here suggests wrongdoing by INEC or anyone else.