The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has announced that it will issue official access codes to all registered political parties on June 26, 2026, to facilitate the nomination of candidates for the 2027 general election.

INEC Chairman, Josiah Amupitan, disclosed this on Tuesday in Abuja during the Second Quarterly Consultative Meeting with leaders of political parties. He explained that the access codes would enable designated national officers of political parties to upload the names, personal particulars, and other required information of nominated candidates through the Commission’s Candidate Nomination Portal.

Amupitan urged political parties to ensure that their ICT personnel and relevant officials are adequately prepared ahead of the process, noting that the portal is fully automated and will automatically close once the stipulated deadline expires.

The INEC chairman also provided an update on preparations for the June 20, 2026 Ekiti State governorship election, describing the Commission’s level of readiness as satisfactory. According to him, the state has a total of 1,059,360 registered voters, following the addition of 66,664 new voters registered during the Continuous Voter Registration exercise to the existing 987,647 voters on the 2023 register.

He added that 2,103 cases of double registration were detected and invalidated to preserve the integrity of the voters’ register.

“Our logistics arrangements, election technology deployment, training of election officials, and stakeholder engagements are all proceeding according to schedule. We remain committed to the simultaneous opening of all 2,445 polling units across the 16 local government areas of the state at 8:30 a.m. on election day,” he said.

Amupitan also addressed recent Federal High Court judgments concerning INEC’s timetable and schedule of activities for the 2027 general election. He noted that while one judgment questioned aspects of the Commission’s timelines, another affirmed INEC’s authority to issue an electoral timetable but nullified certain provisions relating to candidate nomination and substitution.

According to him, the Commission has appealed the judgments to seek definitive clarification from appellate courts, stressing that electoral activities are interconnected processes that require coordinated timelines for effective election management.

He maintained that activities such as submission of party membership registers, monitoring of party primaries, candidate nominations, ballot printing, and quality assurance procedures must be harmonised within a clear and workable electoral framework to ensure transparency, certainty, and administrative efficiency.

Amupitan assured political parties and Nigerians that INEC remains committed to conducting the 2027 general election in strict compliance with the Constitution, the Electoral Act, and all lawful judicial pronouncements.

Speaking at the meeting, the National Chairman of the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC), Dr. Yusuf Dantalle, called for a comprehensive review of the Electoral Act 2026, citing challenges encountered by political parties during the recently concluded primaries.

Dantalle argued that the restriction of parties to either consensus or direct primaries under Section 84(2) of the Electoral Act created significant operational and financial difficulties, leading to disputes, internal tensions, and legal challenges in several parties.

He urged the National Assembly and relevant stakeholders to amend the law to provide political parties with greater flexibility in selecting candidates, provided such processes remain democratic, transparent, and consistent with constitutional principles.

The IPAC chairman maintained that electoral laws should strengthen democratic participation and political institutions rather than create unnecessary obstacles to effective political competition.