2027: INEC overhauls party guidelines to align with Electoral Act 2026

By Omeiza Ajayi

ABUJA: As part of efforts to fortify Nigeria’s democratic foundation, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has launched a comprehensive technical review of its regulations for political parties.

This exercise aims to synchronise the commission’s framework with the recently enacted Electoral Act 2026, ensuring legal clarity and operational integrity well before the 2027 general election.

The review, spearheaded by the commission’s Chairman, Prof. Joash Ojo Amupitan, SAN, focuses on strengthening oversight and reducing the persistent pre-election disputes that often clogged the judicial system.

In a statement by his Chief Press Secretary and Media Adviser, Adedayo Oketola, yesterday, the chairman emphasised that the integrity of an election was rooted in the conduct of the parties involved.
“For elections to inspire public confidence, the institutions that produce candidates must themselves operate transparently and within the law,” Prof. Amupitan noted.
The technical workshop brings together national commissioners, legal experts and directors to perform a clause-by-clause assessment of the 2022 framework.
Central to this reform is the mainstreaming of the Political Party Performance Index, PPPI, a diagnostic tool designed to shift INEC’s role from reactive enforcement to proactive supervision, based on measurable governance standards.
The commission is specifically targeting long-standing issues such as opaque primary elections, weak financial disclosures and the exclusion of marginalized groups.
The revised guidelines will introduce stricter benchmarks for the participation of women, youth, and Persons with Disabilities PWDs within party structures, alongside more rigorous membership documentation protocols.
Technical support for the process is being provided by the Westminster Foundation for Democracy WFD.
Commenting on the collaboration, WFD Country Director, Adebowale Olorunmola, described the initiative as a reconstruction of Nigeria’s democratic foundation.
“We are moving toward an era where political parties are held to the same high standards of integrity as the electoral commission itself,” Olorunmola stated, adding that empirical evidence from the PPPI would help deepen internal party democracy.
Upon completion of the technical phase, INEC plans to present a consolidated draft of the 2026 Revised Regulations to the Inter-Party Advisory Council IPAC and other stakeholders for validation.
By aligning these subsidiary laws early, the Commission intends to minimize administrative friction and ensure that political parties function as disciplined institutions capable of producing credible leadership for the nation.

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