Follow Us on Google
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has attributed the appearance of suspected artificial intelligence-generated photographs and other questionable entries in its preliminary voter register to irregularities allegedly introduced by some registration officers.
The commission’s Director of Information and Communication Technology, Dr Lawrence Bayode, disclosed this during an interview on Arise Television on Friday.
Bayode explained that some registration officers across the country allegedly used their login credentials to introduce irregular records into the voter database.
He said INEC uncovered the questionable entries through its Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS), which was deployed to examine the registration records.
“We have registration officers on the field. And these registration officers, they have login details to log into the system.
“So what we have found is that some of these registration officers, not all of them now, some of them across the states nationwide, they’ve done different things to bring these irregularities onto the register,” he said.
The ICT director explained that while some of the suspicious photographs were generated using AI, others were products of poor registration procedures.
“Some of these pictures are AI-generated. Some of them not AI-generated, but very bad registration. And this thing got into the register by the registration officers and because they have access to register people,” Bayode said.
“When the ABIS was run on the system, we saw these people. We know what they did. We know how they did it. But honestly, I don’t know why,” he added.
Bayode said INEC had begun cleaning up the voter register before making the preliminary version available to the public, noting that the exercise was being carried out within the statutory 90-day period.
His disclosure follows concerns raised over suspicious photographs and other discrepancies after the commission uploaded its preliminary register of voters to its website on October 26.
Screenshots circulated on social media had shown photographs suspected to be AI-generated attached to voter records in parts of Edo State.
Other complaints involved alleged duplicate entries and reports by some registered voters that their details were missing from the online register.
INEC had earlier explained that the online version was the same preliminary register displayed physically at Registration Areas across the country from October 9 to 15 for the Display, Claims and Objections exercise.
In a statement issued on October 27, the commission said it had identified and flagged some questionable records during the physical display and had commenced a review to correct the irregularities.
It also clarified that the published document was not the final certified register, adding that the online release did not capture all the data-cleanup activities still underway.
