The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is currently processing a surge of applications from groups seeking political party status, with Chairman Prof. Mahmood Yakubu revealing Wednesday that 110 associations have formally expressed interest in registration. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking at a media consultative meeting in Abuja, Yakubu addressed growing speculation about the commission’s neutrality in handling the requests. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Clearly, one of the topical issues on election administration in our country today is the status of the letters of intent we received from associations seeking registration as political parties,” he noted, dismissing claims of bias as baseless. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The INEC chief drew parallels to similar accusations in 2013, when critics alleged the commission favored the ruling party during merger negotiations. “Nothing can be further from the truth,” Yakubu asserted, reminding stakeholders that the current administration had previously registered 91 parties for the 2019 elections before deregistering over 70 under legal provisions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We wish to reassure Nigerians that under the current situation, we will continue to be guided by law and act with fairness to all associations,” he pledged, emphasizing equal treatment for all applicants regardless of their promoters’ status. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As of June 23, all but six of the 110 applications\u2014received too recently for immediate processing\u2014had been formally acknowledged. Yakubu directed prospective parties to INEC’s online portal, noting: “The handbook containing the Regulations and Guidelines for Political Parties 2022 is already available on the Commission\u2019s website.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The disclosure comes amid heightened political activity nationwide, with INEC walking a tightrope between inclusive democracy and manageable electoral logistics. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) is currently processing a surge of applications from groups seeking political party status, with Chairman Prof. Mahmood Yakubu revealing Wednesday that 110 associations have formally expressed interest in registration. Speaking at a media consultative meeting in Abuja, Yakubu addressed growing speculation about the commission’s neutrality in handling the requests. “Clearly, one of the topical issues on election administration in our country today is the status of the letters of intent we received from associations seeking registration as political parties,” he noted, dismissing claims of bias as baseless. The INEC chief drew parallels to similar accusations in 2013, when critics alleged the commission favored the ruling party during merger negotiations. “Nothing can be further from the truth,” Yakubu asserted, reminding stakeholders that the current administration had previously registered 91 parties for the 2019 elections before deregistering over 70 under legal provisions. “We wish to reassure Nigerians that under the current situation, we will continue to be guided by law and act with fairness to all associations,” he pledged, emphasizing equal treatment for all applicants regardless of their promoters’ status. As of June 23, all but six of the 110 applications\u2014received too recently for immediate processing\u2014had been formally acknowledged. Yakubu directed prospective parties to INEC’s online portal, noting: “The handbook containing the Regulations and Guidelines for Political Parties 2022 is already available on the Commission\u2019s website.” The disclosure comes amid heightened political activity nationwide, with INEC walking a tightrope between inclusive democracy and manageable electoral logistics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24943,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25826"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25826\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25827,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25826\/revisions\/25827"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fctnewsgazette.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}