Reported by: Oahimire Omone Precious | Edited by: Oravbiere Osayomore Promise.
The Federal High Court in Abuja has adjourned the N10 billion fundamental rights enforcement suit filed by Nollywood actor and politician Emeka Ike against the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Lere Olayinka, media aide to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike. The court fixed July 22, 2026, for further mention after the electoral body failed to appear at Thursday's proceedings.
When the matter, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1272/2026, came up before Justice S.O. Ibrahim, counsel to the plaintiff, L.T. Adeh, informed the court that hearing notices had been served on both respondents, but INEC, the second respondent, was absent. Adeh prayed the court for an adjournment to enable the electoral body to appear. Counsel for the first respondent, Akpama Ekwe, did not oppose the application but urged the court to fix the matter for hearing, arguing that INEC could not be compelled to appear. Justice Ibrahim, however, ruled that a short adjournment was necessary in the interest of fair hearing and to afford INEC an opportunity to participate in the proceedings. The judge ordered that INEC be served with fresh hearing notices alongside all processes filed in the suit before the next adjourned date.
The legal action stems from allegations that Ike's personal voter registration details were unlawfully disclosed on Olayinka's official X handle after screenshots showing the transfer of his voter registration from Imo State to the Federal Capital Territory surfaced on social media in May 2026. Ike contends that the information was published without his consent after being accessed from a restricted INEC administrative portal. The controversy emerged after Olayinka shared the screenshots while questioning Ike's qualification to participate in political activities linked to a House of Representatives seat for the AMAC/Bwari Federal Constituency, Abuja.
Ike, who aspired to vie for the seat on the platform of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), lost the bid in a primary poll. In the suit, the actor is seeking N10 billion in damages for the alleged breach of his right to privacy, as well as orders directing the removal of the social media post and a public apology from the defendants. He also contends that INEC has a statutory responsibility to safeguard the personal information of registered voters and prevent unauthorised access to such records.
INEC has maintained that the incident did not result from a cyberattack on its database but from the misuse of authorised internal access credentials by an electoral officer. The commission had earlier attributed the unauthorised disclosure to the misuse of valid internal credentials by authorised personnel. Investigators from the Force Intelligence Department, Intelligence Response Team (FID-IRT), also grilled Olayinka and an electoral officer over the alleged leak of voter data from the INEC portal.
Speaking after the proceedings, Ekwe, counsel to Olayinka, described the evidence tendered by the plaintiff as "inadmissible" and insisted that his client did not violate any law. "What my client published, apart from being in the public domain, does not contain any personal information. The only thing that document contained is the name of Emeka Ike and the transfer number. The second document contained his passport photograph and his name. So you will agree with me that there was no personal data that was published as is alleged. So there is actually no case against my client," Ekwe said.
Adeh, however, expressed confidence in his client's claim, noting that the case would serve as a precedent to prevent future breaches of voters' data. "It is very possible that whoever accessed this thing must have also been able to access other records. So it is not just Emeka Ike. But we want to use Emeka Ike's case to stop this," Adeh told journalists after the hearing. He added that Ike was magnanimous to have only demanded N10 billion in damages.
The suit has drawn significant attention to the protection of voters' personal data in Nigeria's electoral process, with the court's decision on July 22 expected to provide further clarity on the case.
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