Nigeria’s electoral commission has warned that escalating leadership disputes and a surge in intra-party litigation are undermining efforts to strengthen the country’s democratic process.
The chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Joash Amupitan, said political parties were increasingly consumed by internal crises and court battles rather than serving as platforms for national development.
Speaking on Wednesday at a technical workshop in Ikot Ekpene, Akwa Ibom State, organised in partnership with the Westminster Foundation for Democracy, Amupitan warned that the trend was creating avoidable legal disputes that frequently draw the electoral body into court proceedings.
“Our collective commitment is being challenged by leadership squabbles and judicialised politics,” he said.
“In the last cycle alone, INEC was joined in scores of suits that could have been avoided by simple adherence to party constitutions. As an independent body, we remain neutral, but we are no longer passive observers.”
The workshop was convened to review and update the commission’s regulations and guidelines for political parties to align with provisions introduced in the recently amended Electoral Act 2026.
The law was passed by the National Assembly of Nigeria on 18 February and signed into law the following day by the president, Bola Tinubu.
Amupitan said the increasing number of leadership disputes and factional battles within political parties had begun to erode internal democracy and weaken the credibility of the electoral process.
“Political parties in Nigeria face a crisis of internal democracy. Of grave concern is the quality of party primaries,” he said.
As the country approaches the primary election window scheduled between 23 April and 30 May 2026, he added, the commission would be closely monitoring compliance with electoral rules to ensure fairness.
“The quality of internal party democracy has a direct bearing on the secondary election conducted by INEC,” he said.
Amupitan also warned that persistent infighting risked turning political parties into arenas of permanent conflict.
“We are currently witnessing a disturbing trend of leadership squabbles and infighting that threaten to turn political parties into theatres of permanent strife rather than vehicles for national development,” he said.
“These frequent leadership tussles do more than dilute party ideologies; they spill over into our courtrooms, resulting in a deluge of unnecessary litigations where INEC is routinely joined as a party. Each day spent defending these intra-party disputes is a day diverted from our primary mandate of election planning.”
In a goodwill message, the country director of the Westminster Foundation for Democracy, Adebowale Olorunmola, said updating the guidelines was necessary to reflect the changes introduced by the new law.
“The 2022 edition of the INEC Regulations and Guidelines served us well in the conduct of the 2023 general elections and subsequent polls,” he said. “However, current realities are no longer what they were four years ago.”
He added that the review would help bridge the gap between the provisions of the new law and the daily operations of political parties.
Earlier, the resident electoral commissioner for Akwa Ibom, Obo Efanga, described the workshop as both strategic and timely.
Efanga said the review of the 2022 regulations governing political parties was necessary to reflect the provisions of the amended Electoral Act, noting that the document regulates party registration, statutory compliance, administration and monitoring of political activities.
He said updating the guidelines would help strengthen the integrity of Nigeria’s electoral process ahead of the next cycle of elections.
