{"id":7924,"date":"2026-11-03T17:31:18","date_gmt":"2026-11-03T17:31:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/11\/03\/2027-why-youth-share-of-voters-dropped-inec\/"},"modified":"2026-11-03T17:31:18","modified_gmt":"2026-11-03T17:31:18","slug":"2027-why-youth-share-of-voters-dropped-inec","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/11\/03\/2027-why-youth-share-of-voters-dropped-inec\/","title":{"rendered":"2027: Why youth share of voters dropped \u2013 INEC"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"2027:<\/p>\n

\u2026.As UniJos wins campus debate finale<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Omeiza Ajayi<\/strong><\/p>\n

ABUJA: The Independent National Electoral Commission INEC has explained why youths now make up 29.79 per cent of the voters\u2019 register being prepared for the 2027 general election, down from 39.65 per cent in the 2023 register.<\/p>\n

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Chairman of the commission, Prof. Joash Amupitan SAN, gave the explanation on Tuesday at the grand finale of the INEC Campus Debate at the Law Theatre of the University of Abuja.<\/p>\n

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He said the drop does not mean fewer young people are interested in elections, but that many who counted as youths in 2023 have simply grown older.<\/p>\n

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\u201cSome questions have been asked, why has the number reduced compared to what we have in 2023? But the truth of the matter is that there has been progressive migration of the categories of persons that were youth in 2023, they have now migrated into different age groups\u201d, Amupitan explained.<\/p>\n

\n

He said the register, \u201cwhich is currently being reviewed through claims and objection,\u201d puts youth representation at 29.79 per cent. The 2023 register had 37,060,399 youths aged 18 to 34, or 39.65 per cent of the 93.4 million registered voters.<\/p>\n

Amupitan said the debate was part of the commission\u2019s effort to confront voter apathy among young people. \u201cOur plan is to catch them young,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He said earlier outings showed how little many young people know about the electoral process. \u201cWhen they ask who is the INEC chairman, unfortunately none of them could get it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The University of Jos won the final, which was held under the theme \u201cNigeria\u2019s Electoral Process and Democracy.\u201d Bayero University, Kano, came second, the University of Ibadan third, and the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, fourth.<\/p>\n

Amupitan, who is a University of Jos alumnus, said the judges\u2019 decision could not be faulted. \u201cFrom the quality of the debate, it was, honestly, it could go either way and they have done justice to it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He said the judges took a long time to compute the scores. \u201cThey were also trying to use technology with their phone making some computations and arithmetics just to ensure that there is accurate delivery,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Amupitan said the result was so clear that no debater or university should think of going to court. \u201cIt will be needless for any of the parties or debaters to think of going to court. So that is why we are not establishing any election petition, any tribunal to review what has been done,\u201d he said light-heartedly.<\/p>\n

He also told the Director of Voter Education and Publicity to keep track of the finalists, saying he would have employed them immediately if the law allowed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are not qualified to have been given automatic employment, if not I will have done that by now,\u201d he said. He added that they must first graduate and complete the National Youth Service Corps NYSC.<\/p>\n

He noted that a debater from Bayero University, Kano, studies medicine, while the two debaters from the University of Jos study law.<\/p>\n

The INEC chairman told the audience that elections under his watch have shown improvement. \u201cI am just one year 10 days in office,\u201d he said, adding that the commission had conducted four off-cycle elections: the Anambra governorship election, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) area council elections in February, the Ekiti governorship election in June and the Osun governorship election in August.<\/p>\n

\u201cGo back to history, Anambra election and Osun election used to be inconclusive. But under our watch, we have ensured to a large extent that those elections are conclusive\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n

On women\u2019s participation, he said the commission has a gender and inclusivity department. He noted that Belgium requires equality in the occupation of political offices, \u201cbut we don\u2019t have such a law in Nigeria yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

To the finalists, he said: \u201cYou have spoken with conviction, with candor and with discipline.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Vice Chancellor of the University of Abuja, Professor Hakeem Babatunde Fawehinmi, urged young Nigerians to collect their voter cards, turn out to vote and hold leaders accountable.<\/p>\n

He commended INEC for the initiative and said debate teaches young people to manage disagreement. \u201cIt can be argued that debate is the opposite of violence,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The post 2027: Why youth share of voters dropped \u2013 INEC<\/a> appeared first on Vanguard News<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Source: <\/p>\n

Vanguard News<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2026.As UniJos wins campus debate finale By Omeiza Ajayi ABUJA: The Independent National Electoral Commission INEC has explained why youths now make up 29.79 per cent of the voters\u2019 register… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7925,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7924"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7924\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7925"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}