By Jude Opara
The All Progressives Congress (APC) has announced the successful completion of the process of submitting the names of its candidates for the 2027 general elections to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC).
National Publicity Secretary (NPS) of the party, Barr Felix Morka in a statement on Sunday said the APC was able to beat the earlier set deadline of July 11, as a sign of its preparedness to participate in the elections.
Morka said because of the inability of the opposition parties to beat the deadline, they had to appeal to INEC for the extension, a development he said shows that they are not even organized enough to challenge the ruling party in the elections.
“Our great Party satisfied this requirement despite the large number of Party candidates contesting on the Party’s platform for the various elective offices.
“At the request of opposition political parties that had failed to meet the July 11 deadline, INEC granted an extension of the deadline to July 14, 2026.
“While INEC acted within its statutory powers and administrative discretion in extending the deadline for opposition parties to upload names of their candidates, it is noteworthy that the extension was necessitated by the stark failure of opposition parties to manage their internal processes to comply with INEC’s submission deadline despite having fewer candidates to manage compared to the APC.
“This development provides yet another clear indication of the opposition’s chronic inherent weakness and raises legitimate questions about their operational capacity. Political parties that cannot efficiently conclude their own internal nomination processes cannot possibly be trusted by Nigerians to possess the competence, discipline, or readiness to govern our great nation or it subnational governments.
“It is starkly ironical that the same opposition parties have repeatedly peddled false, malicious and unfounded tales that the APC controls and dictates INEC’s decisions. Yet, as they failed to meet the submission deadline, they shamelessly turned to the same INEC for respite, and were granted an extension. And the same APC that would have been the obvious beneficiary if INEC had stood firm on its original deadline, kept its distance, having met the deadline and completed its submission. Again, this underscores the oppositions’ hypocrisy, and true character as peddlers of fake news and merchants of blackmail”.
According to him, the successful completion of the exercise by the APC, the ruling party has once again demonstrated its leadership and organizational prowess.
“With the successful upload of particulars of all its Presidential, Vice Presidential, Senate, and House of Representatives candidates on the INEC Candidate Nomination Portal, APC has, again, demonstrated its leadership and superior organisational capacity, discipline, and solid commitment to due process”.
However, the party called on its members and stakeholders from across the country to remain focused and continue to strengthen the party, bearing in mind the need to work for the electoral victory of President Bola Tinubu, to enable him continue with his transformative agenda.
