Founder of the GoNigeria Initiative, Atedo Peterside, has cautioned against being carried away by the outcome of the 2026 Osun State governorship election, urging Nigerians to remain vigilant over the electoral process.
Peterside, whose civic engagement platform is backed by the ANAP Foundation, said the election demonstrated the importance of high voter turnout in limiting opportunities for electoral malpractice.
In a post on his X handle on Sunday, Peterside said the reported 43.4 per cent voter turnout in Osun was significant by recent Nigerian standards, but insisted that citizens must continue to hold electoral authorities accountable.
“Some of us refuse to get carried away by the #OsunGuber2026 Election result.
“The only thing it really proves is that a large voter turnout (43.4% in Osun is high by recent Nigerian standards) is the best antidote to rigging and that we must all join hands to hold @inecnigeria’s ‘feet to the fire.’”
The GoNigeria founder also raised questions over the incomplete uploading of results to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) Result Viewing Portal (IREV), despite the conclusion of voting and the declaration of Governor Ademola Adeleke as winner.
Peterside said that as of 8:50 a.m. on Sunday, 98.35 per cent of the results had been uploaded to the IREV portal, rather than the expected 100 per cent.
“As at 8.50am on the day after the elections (today), INEC’s IREV had 98.35% of the results uploaded instead of 100%,” he said.
He consequently demanded an explanation from INEC over the results from 62 polling units that were yet to be uploaded.
“INEC must still explain why they have NOT uploaded the results from 62 Polling Units out of 3,763 Polling Units i.e. notwithstanding the fact that those results are now largely inconsequential because Governor @AAdeleke_01 has already won,” he said.
Peterside stressed that the apparent gap in the results upload should not be ignored simply because the election had already produced a clear winner.
He urged Nigerians to remain actively engaged in the electoral process and continue demanding transparency and accountability from INEC.
His comments came after INEC declared Adeleke, the Accord Party candidate, winner of the August 15 governorship election after he secured 511,067 votes, defeating All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate Bola Oyebamiji, who polled 444,815 votes.
The African Democratic Congress (ADC) candidate, Najeem Salaam, finished third with 17,180 votes.
