EFCC cracks down on vote buying in Lagos LG elections

Michael Olumide

Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) deployed operatives to local governments and Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs) in Lagos to monitor and prevent electoral fraud and financial crimes during the State’s local government elections held on Saturday, July 12, 2025

According to the Head, Media and Publicity, EFCC, Mr Dele Oyewale, the monitoring operations aimed to prevent any form of voter inducement such as vote buying, vote selling, or other manipulations that violate the Electoral Act.

Earlier, while addressing the officers assigned to monitor the electoral process, the Acting Zonal Director, Lagos Zonal Directorate 2, Assistant Commander of the EFCC, ACE 1 Ahmed Ghali, reaffirmed the Commission’s mandate to ensure that finances are not misused for wrongdoing.

According to him, “We are going there to monitor the election and ensure that it is peaceful.”

Ghali later toured several polling units in the Ikeja, Agege, Surulere, and Apapa local government areas.

Speaking on the exercise and the reports from the Directorate’s personnel on duty, he said: “The exercise has been peaceful. We have not received any news of vote buying in any of the polling units visited so far. We are still monitoring until voting is completed”.

In Lagos 1, Zonal Director and Chief of Staff to the Executive Chairman, Commander of the EFCC, CE Michael Nzekwe, also charged officers deployed for the exercise to be civil, professional and forthright in monitoring the elections. He led operatives to monitor polling activities in several key areas across the state.

Their visible presence at the grassroots level underscored the Commission’s unwavering commitment to promoting transparency, accountability and institutional vigilance in Nigeria’s electoral processes.