Former Bayelsa State Governor and Senator representing Bayelsa West, Seriake Dickson, has urged a complete overhaul of Nigeria’s electoral system to advertise larger transparency and accountability within the nation’s polls.
Speaking throughout an interview on Arise Television on Thursday, the twenty third of October, 2025, the lawmaker, who additionally serves on the Senate Committee on Electoral Matters, emphasised the necessity for significant reforms that might make the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) extra answerable to the general public.
Dickson argued that candidates usually face difficulties proving electoral irregularities since they haven’t any management over the electoral course of managed solely by INEC.
He defined that one of many proposals being debated within the ongoing modification of the Electoral Act seeks to switch the burden of proof in election disputes from candidates or political events to INEC itself.
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According to him, “Elections should be moments where we rediscover ourselves as a nation and celebrate what is best about us, not moments where people kill, maim, or write non-existent figures to win without the people’s mandate.
“The burden of proof in electoral matters must shift to INEC. That is where it rightly and properly belongs. We should not subject it to the normal evidential rule that says, he who alleges must prove,” he mentioned.
