The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has rejected the presidential nomination of former President Goodluck Jonathan submitted by the Kabiru Turaki-led faction of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), insisting that all candidate nominations must be made through its official electronic portal.
The Turaki-led faction had earlier announced that it manually submitted Jonathan’s nomination, along with the names of its governorship, National Assembly and state assembly candidates for the 2027 general election, claiming it acted in line with the Electoral Act 2026 after INEC allegedly refused to provide the access codes required for electronic filing.
However, INEC's Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Victoria Eta-Messi, dismissed the submission, stating that the commission only accepts nominations made through its dedicated online portal.
Despite the rejection, the faction's National Publicity Secretary, Ini Ememobong, maintained that the manual submission was valid and warned INEC against publishing any candidate list different from the one submitted by his group.
Ememobong also accused the electoral commission of abandoning its neutrality in the PDP leadership dispute and alleged that opposition parties were being deliberately weakened. He said the faction would continue to pursue legal action to defend what it described as the authentic PDP leadership and candidate list.
