Raphael Kanu
The Federal Court of Canada has upheld a decision categorising Nigeria’s two dominant political parties — the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) — as terrorist organisations. The ruling also denied asylum to former party member Douglas Egharevba, citing his long-standing affiliation with both groups.
In a judgment delivered on June 17, 2025, Justice Phuong Ngo dismissed Egharevba’s bid for judicial review after the Immigration Appeal Division (IAD) found him inadmissible under Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA). The Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness argued that both parties had been implicated in political violence, subversion of democracy, and electoral bloodshed in Nigeria.
Court records revealed that Egharevba was a PDP member from 1999 to 2007 before joining the APC, where he remained until 2017. He relocated to Canada in September 2017, openly disclosing his political history. However, Canadian immigration authorities flagged his affiliations based on intelligence reports linking the parties to election-related violence and politically motivated killings.
The IAD’s decision leaned heavily on the PDP’s conduct during the 2003 state elections and 2004 local government polls, where the party allegedly engaged in ballot stuffing, voter intimidation, and killings of opposition supporters. The tribunal concluded that PDP leaders benefited from the violence and failed to act against it — actions meeting Canada’s legal definition of democratic subversion under paragraph 34(1)(b.1) of the IRPA.
Justice Ngo affirmed that under paragraph 34(1)(f) of the IRPA, mere membership in an organisation linked to terrorism or democratic subversion is sufficient to trigger inadmissibility — even without evidence of personal involvement. Egharevba’s argument that political violence was common across all Nigerian parties was rejected.
The court further held that even flawed Nigerian elections are recognised as a democratic process under Canadian law, and undermining them constitutes subversion.
This decision not only ends Egharevba’s asylum claim but also paves the way for his deportation from Canada.