By Mustapha Salisu
The Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) has flagged digital anomalies affecting the websites of four political parties participating in the Osun State governorship election scheduled for Saturday, August 15, 2026.
The development was contained in the second preliminary report released by CITAD through its AI-based digital rights monitoring platform, PAWSON-Monitor, which is tracking digital access, political parties’ websites, and possible data and privacy breaches ahead of the election.
CITAD launched the platform last week as a pilot initiative to monitor digital rights violations and data and privacy breaches involving political actors and their digital presence during the Osun governorship election.
The organisation said the platform was designed to monitor possible restrictions on the websites of participating political parties, their candidates and social media platforms, as well as potential misuse of citizens’ personal data for political campaigns.
According to the report issued on Friday, August 14, PAWSON-Monitor monitored 15 political parties within the preceding 24 hours, conducting a total of 17,888 checks on their websites.
The report said 11 of the parties had operational websites throughout the monitoring period, with no significant anomalies recorded to suggest an urgent issue or deliberate attempt to undermine their digital presence.
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However, CITAD identified anomalies affecting the websites of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Allied Peoples Movement (APM), Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), and Action Peoples Party (APP).
It said the websites of the APM and PRP required particular attention, while the Young Progressives Party (YPP) recorded a relatively low success rate of 57.3 per cent during the monitoring period.
“Based on the data scraped and analysed, action is required from the parties to rectify the anomalies to be able to operate optimally and take advantage of the digital presence, especially at a crucial moment like this,” the report stated.
CITAD further noted that PDP and APP, which were not previously among the parties flagged for website anomalies, had now joined the list, increasing the number of parties with red flags on their digital platforms.
The organisation therefore urged all political parties, particularly those whose websites are experiencing anomalies, to take immediate steps to identify and resolve the problems.
CITAD said ensuring that political parties have functional digital platforms is important to providing equal opportunities and fair play for all contestants, particularly as digital platforms have become increasingly important tools for political communication and voter engagement.
The organisation said the Osun monitoring exercise would also help assess whether democratic principles of equal access and fair participation are being upheld in the digital environment before, during and after the election.
It added that the pilot initiative would serve as a basis for deploying PAWSON-Monitor during the 2027 general elections.
CITAD assured that it would continue monitoring the digital environment and carrying out human and cross-network verification of emerging anomalies to determine whether reported disruptions to political parties’ digital platforms are genuine.
The organisation said any confirmed disruption would be identified, documented and appropriately reported.