L-R: Panel Moderator Ken Ugbechue, Mr. Lanre Arogundade (Executive Director, International Press Institute, IPI), Dr. Abayomi Shogunle, Commissioner of Police, Election Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Force Headquarters, Abuja, Dr. Adaora Onyechere Sydney-Jack (Creative Director, Gender Agenda, Founder of WEWE Network Afrique), and Prof. Tayo Popoola (Head of Department, Mass Communication, University of Lagos) during the panel discussion at the 2026 annual conference of the Guild of Corporate Publishers (GOCOP) held in Lagos on Thursday, October 8, 2026.
The leadership of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) has revealed how they will secure the 176,846 polling units across the country where voting is scheduled for the 2027 general elections.
The Force stated that they would use a predictive and risk-analysis strategy to identify where trouble could erupt, which would guide their deployment of personnel.
Dr. Abayomi Shogunle, Commissioner of Police, Election Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Force Headquarters, Abuja, disclosed this during a panel session at the 2026 annual conference of the Guild of Corporate Publishers (GOCOP) held in Lagos.
The conference had as its theme, “2027 Elections: Trust, Transparency and Shared Responsibilities.”
Shogunle was part of a four-person panel including Prof. Tayo Popoola (Head of Department, Mass Communication, University of Lagos), Dr. Adaora Onyechere Sydney-Jack (Creative Director, Gender Agenda, Founder of WEWE Network Afrique), and Mr. Lanre Arogundade (Executive Director, International Press Institute, IPI). The panel was moderated by Ken Ugbechue, Publisher, Political Economist.
The panel analysed the keynote presentation of the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Joash Amupitan, represented by the Lagos State INEC Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC), Prof Ayobami Salami.
Shogunle revealed that the Police have already started deployment for the 2027 elections, even as he assured of an adequate number of personnel to effectively police the general elections.
He said: “We found out that we needed to do different things. We brought in the academic angle as it is done in other countries. The Anambra State election was our first test. For once, election was conducted in one day. There was no shooting, no killing. There rather was an increase in voter turnout.”
“Next were Abuja and Ekiti, and there were no issues too. In Anambra, our academic approach was the use of the problem analysis triangle. For crime to happen, there are three factors that must come together: Perpetrator, lack of guardianship and the victim. We removed all those that were against election”, he added.
He also spoke about activating ‘Deterrence theory’ to stop people who were having plans. “In Ekiti, we knew about their closeness to Kogi, Kwara, etc. We used multi-layered approach.”
He said election security management has changed, noting that an election in only one State attracts many outsiders who could create problems. He said the Police would follow only what the law stipulated about elections, especially on who should announce results.
