The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has warned political parties that candidates whose names are missing from their membership registers risk disqualification from the 2027 general elections, following a Supreme Court judgment reinforcing the legal requirements for party membership and candidate nomination.
INEC National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, Mohammed Kudu Haruna, disclosed this during an appearance on Trust TV’s Daily Politics programme on Wednesday evening.
Haruna said the commission would take a final decision on the implications of the Supreme Court judgment by next week, noting that candidates and members of the public were eager to know how the ruling would affect their participation in the forthcoming elections.
“Hopefully, we will definitely meet next week to be able to take a decision on this, because I know a lot of people are anxious, not just candidates themselves; even the public are anxious. They want to know, given the way the Supreme Court has strengthened our hands,” he said.
The Supreme Court, in its September 24, 2026 judgment in INEC v. Zenith Labour Party, affirmed Sections 77(5)–(7) of the Electoral Act 2026 and upheld INEC’s revised timetable for the 2027 general elections.
According to Haruna, the judgment reinforced the commission’s position that political parties must submit their membership registers to INEC at least three weeks before conducting their primaries.
He stressed that political parties affected by the ruling would not be allowed to substitute candidates as a means of circumventing the legal requirements, insisting that no party should benefit from its own violation of the law.
Addressing concerns that the affected parties might attempt to replace their candidates with new nominees, the INEC commissioner said such a move would come too late and could not provide a way around the legal consequences.
“It’s too late to do anything. The party won’t even be able to contest. It’s like you committed an offence and then you come and benefit from it. You remember cases that we had in Zamfara, you remember Plateau? Same thing,” he said.
Haruna added that permitting candidate substitution in such circumstances would amount to rewarding political parties for failing to comply with the law.
“The parties, because they did the wrong thing, they thought they could now steal through the candidates. And the law was very clear. Once you do that kind of thing, you cannot benefit from it. You are benefiting from it if you are able to substitute a candidate,” he stated.
He further warned that some political parties might be barred from fielding candidates for certain elective positions, including governorship and State House of Assembly seats, if their nominees were not registered members of the parties when they contested for their respective tickets.
“So, what it means is that when we look at the law and take a decision, some parties may not be able to field even governorship candidates, or all the candidates, all the way to the Houses of Assembly, if their names are not on the party register and they were not members of the party as at the time they contested for those tickets,” Haruna said.
The commissioner explained that INEC was taking time to reach a final decision because it needed to obtain the Certified True Copy (CTC) of the Supreme Court judgment and secure the necessary legal advice before determining the implications for the affected political parties.
He said the commission had to exercise caution in handling the matter because of previous incidents in which individuals presented forged court judgments, including documents purportedly issued by the Supreme Court.
“You can’t be too careful with these things because even when you see copies and they tell you it’s CTC, it may be forged. We’ve seen instances where people have even gone, have the audacity to forge a Supreme Court judgment. So we have to be very careful,” he said.
Earlier, INEC Chairman, Professor Joash Ojo Amupitan, disclosed on Tuesday that the commission had investigated and resolved 112 formal complaints relating to the unlawful withdrawal and substitution of candidates, except for cases still pending before the courts.
Amupitan also confirmed that INEC received the Certified True Copy of the Supreme Court judgment on Tuesday morning.
Under the revised electoral timetable, the presidential and National Assembly elections are scheduled for Saturday, January 16, 2027, while the governorship and State House of Assembly elections will take place on Saturday, February 6, 2027.
Political party primaries were scheduled to hold between April 23 and May 30, 2026, while the submission of candidates’ nominations was fixed for June 27 to July 11, 2026.
The commission’s forthcoming decision is expected to clarify the position of political parties whose candidates may have failed to meet the membership-register requirements ahead of the 2027 general elections.
