Opposition parties whose governorship candidates were left off the Independent National Electoral Commission’s final list for 2027 have taken different roads to get them back on the ballot. The Nigeria Democratic Congress says it is negotiating with the commission, while the Social Democratic Party says it has already served legal papers. The dispute comes less than four months before the governorship and State Houses of Assembly elections on February 6, 2027.
The NDC’s National Publicity Secretary said the party had not gone to court and was relying on the 14-day window in the Electoral Act 2026 to correct errors in the published list. “We are exploring all legal and constitutional means to ensure that all our candidates are duly recognised,” he said. The SDP’s National Publicity Secretary, Rufus Abiyegba, said his party had prepared an affidavit and served it on INEC. “We have hope in the judiciary; the process, we have activated it,” he said.
The omissions cut across at least four parties and several states. The PDP’s governorship candidates in Ogun and Gombe, Oladipupo “Ladi” Adebutu and former Communications Minister Isa Pantami, do not appear on the list. The ADC and NDC candidates in Cross River were left out of a field of eight, as was the SDP’s candidate in Benue, Prof. Sebastine Hon, SAN.
In Kano, the NDC governorship candidate, Aminu Abdulsalam Gwarzo, and his running mate, Mustapha Rabiu Kwankwaso, are missing. Yusuf Ibrahim Kotamata, the party’s House of Representatives candidate in the state, blamed an error in entering the candidates’ details and said the party had received assurances that INEC was working on a correction. He said Gwarzo completed his registration on time and his details were submitted through the commission’s online portal.
The list, signed by INEC Secretary Rose Oriaran-Anthony, shows how uneven the damage is. The NDC has no governorship candidate in six states: Ogun, Kano, Kebbi, Cross River, Nasarawa and Kaduna. The PDP is absent in Ogun, Kebbi and Gombe, while the ADC has candidates in 27 states. In Ogun, 13 candidates from 13 parties were cleared, leaving the PDP, which came second in the 2023 governorship race there, without a name on the ballot.
The law offers a route back, but it is narrow. Section 32(2) of the Electoral Act 2026 requires a party that finds its candidate missing from the published list to notify INEC in writing, backed by an affidavit, within 14 days. With the list released on October 10, that window would close around October 24. INEC has said it will not respond to reports about the missing candidates, indicating it expects parties to use the formal process.
Not every omission appears to be clerical. On September 24, the Supreme Court upheld Sections 77 and 84 of the Electoral Act 2026, which bar parties from fielding candidates whose names were not on membership registers submitted to INEC within the statutory period. INEC Chairman, Prof. Joash Amupitan, said on October 6 that the commission had just received the certified true copy of that judgment and was studying it. The ruling has created uncertainty for politicians who moved to new parties after losing tickets in their old ones.
INEC has not publicly given reasons for any specific omission. Questions have been raised over whether Adebutu’s name appeared on the PDP register submitted to the commission, but this has not been confirmed. Adebutu has insisted that his documents were submitted within the prescribed time and that his exclusion does not end his ambition. The Ogun PDP has accused the APC of pressuring INEC to drop him, a claim the commission has not addressed.
Pantami’s case carries a separate complication, as his emergence as candidate was challenged in court by other PDP aspirants. In Cross River, a rival claimant to the ADC ticket, Effiong Nyong, said there was “a matter in court over the ticket”, which he argued prevents INEC from entering any name. The NDC’s Cross River candidate, John Upan Odey Jr, has described his own omission as a bureaucratic error.
The PDP has asked its candidates and supporters to remain calm while it engages INEC. Its National Publicity Secretary, Jungudo Haruna Mohammed, said the party was treating the matter seriously and would give updates as discussions progressed. Hon, for his part, has expressed confidence that his omission will be corrected.
The stakes go beyond individual ambitions. Presidential and National Assembly elections hold on January 16, 2027, three weeks before the governorship polls, and a party without a governorship candidate in a state loses a key mobilising figure for both contests. Amupitan has repeatedly said the commission “has no candidates” and no party preference. How INEC handles the written complaints over the next fortnight, and how the courts treat cases tied to the Supreme Court ruling, will determine which names finally appear on the ballot.