‘INEC Aiding Tinubu’s Agenda To Disenfranchise ADC, Other Opposition Parties’
By Sunday Etuka
The Media Office of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has accused the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of complicity in what it described as an attempt by President Bola Tinubu to disenfranchise African Democratic Congress (ADC) and other opposition parties, following a claim by Nafiu Gombe that he had successfully uploaded candidates’ names on INEC’s portal.
In a statement on Monday, the Atiku Media Office said Gombe, who has been parading himself as ADC National Chairman, announced on July 11, 2026, that he had uploaded the names of the party’s candidates on INEC’s Candidate Nomination Portal as part of the process for 2027 general elections, which requires political parties to be granted access codes by the Commission.
The statement noted that INEC had neither confirmed nor denied the claim, which it described as a contradiction of the electoral body’s own guidelines and the law.
According to the Atiku camp, INEC has previously recognised the leadership of the ADC under Senator David Mark, and the granting of an access code to Gompe, whom it said lacked legal standing to the party’s chairmanship, amounted to further evidence of what it called the Commission’s partisanship under its Chairman, Prof. Joash Amupitan.
The statement drew a comparison with an earlier incident in which it alleged the Amupitan-led INEC removed the names of the ADC executive duly recognised, following a ruling by Justice Lifu, disregarding the ruling of an appellate court.
The Atiku Media Office argued that Gombe’s claimed submission of candidates has no basis in law or in INEC guidelines, insisting that a political party cannot have two recognised chairmen or be issued two access codes by the electoral Commission.
Citing Section 222 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), which requires that candidates of a political party emerge through recognised Primary supervised by INEC, and Section 84 of the Electoral Act, 2022 (as amended), which stipulates that parties must submit only one validly nominated candidate per elective office, the statement alleged that Gombe and his associates did not conduct any primaries before the purported submission.
The statement described the granting of an access code to Gombe as “unconstitutional and unlawful,” maintaining that only candidates submitted under David Mark’s leadership are recognised by law, and that any parallel submission is “null and void.”
The Atiku Media Office called on Amupitan to desist from what it described as fermenting crisis within the ADC and other opposition parties, alleging that doing so serves President Tinubu’s agenda of what it termed “total state capture.”
