Anambra Poll;CDD-West Africa Calls For Conscious Effort To End Voter Apathy
The Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) has commended the people of Anambra for improving on their turnout in the Saturday governorship election over the 2021 record.
CDD made the commendation at the 2025 Anambra governorship post-election
news conference in Awka on Sunday.
Mrs Seyi Awojulugbe, a Misinformation, Disinformation and Hate Speech Analyst at CDD commended the Permanent Voter Cards collection rate of 98.8 per cent and 99.62 per cent result uploaded on the IREV by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Awojulugbe said the election was generally peaceful and that INEC made significant progress.
The group said turnout in the election was poor even though it stood at 21.4 per cent in relation to the total of registered voters against the 10.2 per cent recorded in 2021.
“Despite high registration numbers, turnout was only 21.4 per cent, this figure is an improvement from the 10.2 percent recorded in the 2021 election, still reflecting a troubling disengagement from the democratic process.
“It underscores the need for renewed efforts in civic education, electoral reform, and meaningful governance that inspire trust and participation.
“A significant proportion of the young population stayed away, despite earlier enthusiasm during the Continuous Voter Registration process.
“Women and persons with disabilities also faced multiple barriers, such as difficulty in accessing the polling booths and the absence of voting aid materials.,” she said
CDD said the 2025 Anambra election revealed that Nigeria’s electoral challenges were deeply linked to wider governance failures which included weak institutions, elite dominance, economic hardship, insecurity, and lack of accountability.
It recommended that the ongoing electoral reforms should target improving INEC’s operational capacity through timely funding, decentralised planning, and consistent communication.
“Such operational issues include logistics, mandatory real-time result publication via IReV, early voting for essential personnel and adequate personnel training.
“Political parties should prioritise voter education and conduct issue-based campaigns, they must be compelled to uphold internal democracy and adhere to transparent campaign financing.
“Governments at all levels must develop a more sustainable security architecture that addresses root causes and provides year-round safety for residents.
“Conscious steps must be taken to discourage vote trading through deliberate efforts to deliver good governance while promoting civic education across all strata of society to discourage transactional politics,” it said
Also speaking, Prof. Victor Adetula
Director and Chair, CDD-West Africa Election Analysis Centre said it had become necessary to consider cost of closing down the economy for elections and evolve alternative system.
Adetula said the shutting down of the economy had not translated to impressive turnout and economic losses from it amounted to double burden.
