Brazil would on October 25, 2026, take the hand of Nigeria to political school, the second in one month. The first one, like in kindergarten, Brazil showed the world, nay, Nigeria, that it is possible for a developing country to conduct an election without rancour, vote buying, and violence.
Coming closely to the time Nigeria is about to go to the polls in January, 2027, there is no reason to give excuses by Nigeria. The first round of the presidential election in Brazil took place on October 4, 2026; in that election, the incumbent President, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Flávio Bolsonaro locked horns looking for a fair share of the 158.7 million votes from voters, in the end, no ballot box snatching, no burning of results sheets, and results were known same night, while the runoff was rescheduled for October 25.
With a population of approximately 213.8 million to 214.2 million people in 2026, according to Worldometer Brazil tracker, Nigeria’s own population hovers around same figures.
Indeed, Nigeria and Brazil share a lot in common: large population, diverse federation, high inequality, and history of military rule. Brazil has over 158.7 million voters while Nigeria has over 103 million registered voters. Such high volume of voters in Brazil is as a result of the fact that Brazil made voting compulsory for every adult citizen, unlike Nigeria where voting is optional.
The first round of election in Brazil has come and gone, with so many lessons, however, the issue is, if a country like Nigeria is ready and humble enough to learn without feeling too big.
Election in Nigeria has become a four-yearly national political event which keeps testing the nation’s strength, maturity, civility, unity, among other indices of civilization, sometimes it appears the nation will simply break away, but in the end it will not, some see it as a game, some see it as serious business, while still it is seen as a necessary end because there is no other credible alternative to democracy.
Indeed, Nigeria’s democracy continues to go by the baptismal name, nascent, in another it is still a young adult, since independence and its republican stage from there up to the present Fourth Republic. Many a time, the nation’s elections are characterised by violence, rigging, cutting corners, many a time election are rigged before the actual voting, many a time, constituencies are delineated to favour a political party, codenamed gerrymandering, sometimes it comes in the form of appointments of the members of electoral commission, they tell them that they are independent, when they are not really.
Again, they make sure they make the judiciary beggarly by appointing their cronies as those in charge of the judiciary so that what they need is for the electoral umpire to pronounce them winners, the rest would be handled by the judiciary, you don’t need to call them, already they know what to do. The pre-election rigging did not exclude those that make laws as they continually create loopholes for manipulation to favour the highest bidders, depending if the election is at state or National level. As in Nigeria, we talk about using paper to right result when there is network issues, but Nigerians have argued that such clause has no meaning, that if bandits, terrorists and kidnappers in the remotest forests can make videos of their activities and there is no network issues, that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, should do better by finding solution so as to make the election in Nigeria truly electronic, because technology doesn’t lie. As it is Brazil has been using complete electronic means to conduct election since 1996.
Of course, that is the bane of Nigeria’s electoral system. From the First Republic down the line, election in Nigeria has never come without complaints. The one that remains indelible in the minds of the people is the 1993 election, adjudged to be the freest and fairest in Nigeria, but what happened, the then military president, General Ibrahim Babangida annulled the election.
It took the doggedness and patriotic stubbornness of the then Chairman of the Electoral Commission, the late Professor Humphrey Nwosu to declare that result, and of course, the military authorities never liked what he did, in fact Prof Nwosu, it was who made it possible for Nigerians to know that the election was won by the accountant-turned businessman, socialite and philanthropist, Moshood Abiola.
That election, if you noticed, is also indicative of lack of accountability in our nation. In a twinkling of an eye, General Babangida cancelled years of planning, sleeplessness, dreams, party engagements, public and individual spending and all of that went down the drains. How much was spent in that 1996 election? The parties that took part in the 1993 general election spent between N120 million to N1 billion.
Even looking at it, it is not for want of good laws, but it is the potentialities of the politicians to cut corners, because they know that this is a game where there is no second position, the nation also practices winner-takes-all, so, it becomes a do-or-die affair, especially when that politician has either not done his homework and assignment well, he wants a shortcut by all means.
Obviously, Brazil used 100 percent electronic voting machines, which they have started using since 1996. No paper ballot to snatch, no ink to smear. All that was needed was, you press, it records, it transmits encrypted to the electoral court (TSE) and Result of the election was in 2-3 hours.
In contrast, for Nigeria, BVAS/IReV is good progress, but still depends on manual collation and upload, which creates loopholes.
In the Brazil presidential election, because no one got 50percent + 1, the two presidential contenders are now expected to go to a runoff on October 25, 2026, to decide the winner. That’s where the real lesson for Nigeria is.
In the Brazilian Election the whole votes were counted same day with electronic machines, by TSE, no ballot snatching. What is TSE? The Brazil’s Tribunal Superior Eleitoral or Superior Electoral Court in English, is not just an organiser, it is a court. It can arrest, fine candidates, remove fake news within hours, but in Nigeria, INEC is administrative. It still needs police and courts to enforce. Brazil shows that when the electoral umpire has judicial power, impunity drops.
Another lesson is that voting is compulsory in Brazil, 53percent of voters are women. Civic education starts early. People see election as duty, not do-or-die. In Nigeria, there is still voter apathy and thuggery, voting is also optional.
In Brazil no godfather control of ballot materials. Also in Brazil, there is no ‘collation centre chaos’ because there is almost nothing to collate physically. Logistics failure is near zero because machines are deployed weeks ahead and tested publicly.
There is swift punishment for electoral violence, and in Brazil, trying to disrupt election is a federal crime with immediate arrest. In Nigeria, ballot snatchers often walk the street free, and top politicians usually what happens to voting from their mansions.
If we want Brazil-like elections, we must move from human-managed to system-managed elections, make BVAS work offline and transmit automatically, give INEC prosecutorial powers like Brazil’s TSE, and punish electoral offenders on election day, not 3 years after.
Brazil proved that even a deeply polarized country, son of jailed ex-president vs sitting president can be in contest without violence as the system makes violence useless.
Nigeria must learn from international best practices even as it concerns election. The will of the people must be upheld in all election, just as Brazil has just demonstrated.
Idris Shuaibu, Kaduna-born politician contesting the ADC governorship position in his state, said: ‘The current general election taking place in Brazil is a test case for democracy especially Nigeria. As usual, it’s a cycle that’s usual after every 5 years. It’s a contest between the two ideological divides of the left and the right. Current President Lula Da Silva and his long-standing rival Flavio Bolsonaro of the left and the right of the centre respectively. Lula scored about 46 percent while Flavio scored 47percent of the votes cast.
For Adetokunbo Pearse, no country in the world is perfect. ‘No democracy is without flaws’, he said.
He further said: ‘You notice even though they would say there is corruption in Brazil, the electoral commission would do the right thing; if he doesn’t do the right thing, they would kill the national chairman, they would burn his house down. In France, 6000 people arrested, over 200 schools shut down, 20 schools burnt, teachers, parents, students’ unions, on the streets asking for good education’ as the people protest.