Behind the APC’s public declaration of victory over a July 11 deadline lies a very different story, according to multiple sources inside the Independent National Electoral Commission, who say no political party in Nigeria, including the ruling party itself, actually met the original cutoff for uploading National Assembly candidates ahead of the 2027 elections.
The contradiction cuts directly against a statement the APC issued on July 12, in which the party credited itself with successfully beating INEC’s deadline despite fielding a large slate of candidates. But according to an INEC insider, that claim doesn’t hold up against what actually happened behind the scenes. “As of July 11 deadline, before the extension to July 14, over 70 per cent of candidates in the APC had not been uploaded by the party. No party met that deadline,” the source said, adding that the commission ultimately had to open its back-end systems just to accommodate the shortfall across the board.
INEC’s own public explanation for the extension, issued through National Commissioner Mohammed Kudu Haruna, attributed the three-day extension to an appeal from the Inter-Party Advisory Council on behalf of parties struggling to complete their submissions in time. That framing left room for the APC to position itself as the exception, the disciplined party bailing out its disorganized rivals. Party spokesman Felix Morka leaned into that narrative forcefully, arguing that the extension exposed “the opposition’s chronic inherent weakness” and questioning whether parties unable to manage their own nomination processes could be trusted to govern. He went further, accusing opposition parties of hypocrisy for previously alleging APC influence over INEC while simultaneously relying on the commission for relief.
The insider account now undercuts that entire framing, suggesting the shortfall was universal rather than confined to the opposition, and that the APC’s public timeline may not reflect what was actually happening inside INEC’s submission portal.
The credibility questions come at an awkward moment for the ruling party, which is simultaneously navigating friction within its own ranks. In Benue State’s Apa constituency, aggrieved APC members and aspirants staged a protest at the party’s national secretariat, accusing local leadership of attempting to impose a candidate through a “same-day ticket” rather than holding a genuine primary. One protester, identified only as Godwin O, warned that bypassing a transparent nomination process risked alienating grassroots members and weakening the party’s electoral prospects, while also singling out party leader Sonny Echono for what he described as limited grassroots engagement.
As of press time, APC’s national leadership had not formally responded to either the submission deadline discrepancy or the Benue protests, leaving both controversies unresolved even as the party publicly projects confidence in its 2027 preparations.
