Restoration of Sections 77(5), 77(6), 77(7) and 84(2) of the Electoral Act 2026: A Cursory Voyage in INEC v. Zenith Labour Party (SC/CR/495/2026), the Statutory Underpinning Governing Substitution of Candidates, and the Implications for Defection, Dual Membership and Candidate Eligibility Ahead of the 2027 General Elections

©By: Odatse Echo Esq. KNOW THE LAW: AS IT IS V. 24/26 (Special Edition); September 27, 2026.

Introduction:

A Word Before the Law:

There is an old saying from the dim past, among sages, that a toad does not run in the daytime for nothing. It is either something is chasing it, or it is chasing something, even when we cannot see what it is. For the past three days, since the Supreme Court pronuncement on September 24, 2026, Nigeria’s political space has been full of toads running in broad daylight. Aspirants who lost their primaries months ago are suddenly rediscovering old friendships in rival parties. Party secretaries who had gone quiet since July are now whispering about “uncertainty in the party to be resolved by peace meeting and by substitutions in view of the judgement.” Some members who defected in August are asking their party chairmen, with straight faces, whether the Supreme Court judgment means they can still make the ballot. Everybody is running. Few are asking what is chasing them, or whether the direction they are running leads anywhere at all.

So much have been written about the Supreme Court judgment and the facts of the case. My learned friends, analysts and commentators in the market of public opinion have already told you what the judgment says in several articles. In this edition, I therefore intend, instead, to tell you what it means for the toad, the road, and the thing that is chasing it in simplest terms possible. Please stay with me, let’s get to the foundation and then to the crux of the matter.

1. What Was Decided, Briefly:

The date was September 24, 2026, the time was within a reasonable time in the eyes of the law. The place was in Abuja. There and then, the Supreme Court, in INEC v. Zenith Labour Party, Suit No. SC/CR/495/2026, manned by a seven member panel led by Justice Adamu Jauro, unanimously allowed INEC’s appeal and restored Sections 77(5), 77(6), 77(7) and 84(2) of the Electoral Act 2026. Before then, the Court of Appeal, Abuja Division, in Appeal No. CA/ABJ/CV/750/2026, had struck those sections down on July 16, 2026, in a judgment led by Justice Balkisu Bello Aliyu with the lead judgment by Justice Eberechi Nyesom Wike. That decision reversed the earlier Federal High Court judgment, which under Justice Mohammed Umar had dismissed ZLP’s challenge on May 5, 2026, in Suit No. FHC/ABJ/509/2026. The Supreme Court restored the Federal High Court’s position, ordered ZLP to pay ₦2,000,000 in costs, and, on the same day, dismissed related appeals by the Social Democratic Party and the Youth Party.

It will interest you to note that Section 77 of the Electoral Act 2026 which subsections has generated much debate, is a seven subsection provision, and it repays reading in full rather than by a single bare number. In summary and for a layman’s understanding, Section 77(1) declares a registered party a body corporate. While Section 77(2) requires it to maintain a digital register of members. Section 77(3) requires a membership card to be issued on registration. Section 77(4) requires that register to be made available to INEC not later than 21 days before the date fixed for the party’s primaries, congresses or conventions. It is Section 77(5), (6) and (7), read against that deadline fixed by subsection (4), that the Supreme Court restored. By those subsection, only members whose names are on that register may vote and be voted for (section 77(5)); a party may not use any register for primaries, congresses or conventions, other than the one submitted to INEC (see section 77(6)); and a party that misses the filing deadline is ineligible to field a candidate at all ( see section 77(7)). By virtue of section 84(2), the procedure for nominating candidates shall be by direct primaries or consensus. The Act provides no third method or other method.

2. The background and Foundations:
Earlier, the argument has always been that issues relating to membership, nomination and selection of Political parties candidate and conduct of parties activities are internal affairs of the party, which the law protects jealousy.

2.1 Party Autonomy Over Internal Affairs, and Its Limits: On this issue, the case of Onuoha v. Okafor (1983) 2 SCNLR 244; JELR 46437 (SC), remains the foundation. In that case, the Supreme Court held that the nomination or sponsorship of a candidate is a political matter within a party’s own discretion, and that a court has no jurisdiction to direct a party on whom to sponsor. Dalhatu v. Turaki, (2003) 15 NWLR (Pt. 843) 310, gave judicial baptism or affirmed the same principle.

The Electoral Act 2026 has now written this legal principle into statute, and hardened it considerably. Section 83(5) provides, subject to the provision of Section 83(3), that no court in Nigeria shall entertain jurisdiction over any suit or matter pertaining to the internal affairs of a political party. Section 83(6) even attaches teeth to that ouster. Where an action is brought in defiance of it, no interim or interlocutory injunction may be granted, the court must reserve its ruling to the stage of final judgment while giving the matter accelerated hearing, and at the conclusion of the matter the court is required to impose costs.

2.2 The Statutory Preconditions for Substitution of a Candidate: Section 33 of the Electoral Act 2026 provides to the effect that a political party shall not be allowed to change or substitute its candidate whose name has been submitted under Section 29 of the Act, except in the case of death or withdrawal by the candidate, and that where such withdrawal or death occurs, the affected party must, within fourteen days of the event, hold another primary election to produce and submit a new candidate to INEC.

It can be irresistibly inferred that two things follow from the above. First, the grounds for substitution are straightforward and settled. It is submitted that a party that wishes to drop a candidate because a more popular aspirant has since defected in, or because internal politics have shifted, has no textual foothold in Section 33 at all. Second, “withdrawal” is not whatever a party leadership says it is. Section 31 of the Act defines it precisely, a candidate withdraws by a notice in writing, signed by him, together with a sworn affidavit, delivered personally by the candidate to the party that nominated him, and the party must then convey that withdrawal and affidavit to INEC not later than 90 days before the election. Methinks a party that announces a “withdrawal” without a signed notice and sworn affidavit personally delivered by the candidate himself has not satisfied Section 31, and therefore has no valid foundation on which to invoke Section 33 at all.

2.3 “Withdrawal” Is Tested Against Cogent and Verifiable Reasons: Even a withdrawal that satisfies Section 31’s formalities can still be challenged as a device. In Ugwu v. Ararume (2007) 12 NWLR (Pt. 1048) 367, the Court held to the effect that a party wishing to substitute a candidate must give INEC cogent and verifiable reasons, and that the bare assertion of an unexplained “error” was not sufficient compliance. Moreso, in Amaechi v. INEC (2008) 5 NWLR (Pt. 1080) 227; the Supreme Court applied this to its full conclusion, voiding a substitution made without cogent and verifiable reasons and declaring the original, wrongly displaced candidate entitled to the office, notwithstanding that he had never appeared on the ballot.

2.4 Multiple Nomination Is Fatal to Candidacy, by Statute and by Case Law: It is submitted that this ground rests on firmer footing than case law alone. Section 35 of the Electoral Act 2026 provides, in plain terms, that where a candidate knowingly allows himself to be nominated by more than one political party, or in more than one constituency, his nomination shall be void. This statutory rule is reinforced by Nwosu v. Action Peoples Party (Suit No. SC. 1384/2019,  judgment delivered December 20, 2019, per Augie JSC, in which the Supreme Court voided the candidature of an aspirant who, after failing to secure his original party’s ticket, defected and secured a second party’s nomination while his name remained tied to the first, holding that a candidate cannot hold two valid nominations at once and cannot benefit from that state of affairs.

3. Application to Current Political Conduct and Matters Arising:

At this juncture, it is sacrosanct to consider this very important issue.

3.1 Those Who Have Been Waiting to Decamp. There is a particular kind of political actor who has spent the last two months sitting quietly, watching this case, holding his defection letter in his pocket like a loaded gun, waiting for September 24 to pull the trigger. His theory was that once the Supreme Court restored these sections, parties with questionable primaries would be thrown into confusion, fresh primaries would be ordered, and a fast mover already defected to the right camp would be perfectly placed to benefit. It is submitted that such assumption, contemplation or
theory does not survive contact with the judgment. The Supreme Court answered a constitutional question and did not order a single fresh primary. The defector who moved in August, expecting a reshuffling, the judgment itself never orders, is discovering that his new party’s register closed long before he arrived, and Section 77(5), read with the 21 day deadline in Section 77(4), does not care how sincere his conversion was.

3.2 Those Waiting to Have Their Names Submitted: A second, quieter group has been lobbying party leadership to have a name inserted into the list sent to INEC, on the theory that a cleared constitutional cloud would give the leadership fresh cover to regularise the position outside the primary process. It is submitted that the judgment tightens, rather than loosens, the requirements for how a name reaches INEC. It further confirms the only lawful paths; that a direct primary run strictly off the filed register, or a consensus process meeting the conditions in Section 87, discussed below. Thus, a name inserted by fiat, outside both processes, breaches Section 77(6) on its own terms.

3.3 Those Waiting for a Substitution: The third and most dangerous group is banking on a “post judgment substitution.” It is submitted that substitution was never governed by the sections the Court of Appeal struck down. And any party attempting one today must still show a death, or a withdrawal formally executed under Section 31. Such party is expected to still hold a fresh primary within fourteen days under Section 33, and that fresh primary must still comply with Section 84(2) and draw from the register filed under Section 77(4) to (7). Accordingly, a substitution manufactured to accommodate a defector, dressed up as a resignation the original candidate never signed and swore to, gains nothing from this judgment.

3.4 The Larger Confusion, and the New Deterrent Nobody Is Talking About:
From the above, what binds all three groups together is the assumption that a decision confirming a statute’s constitutionality creates novel opportunities under it. It is submitted with utmost respect that the reverse is the case. But there is now a second, sharper danger for anyone tempted to march into court over any of this. Section 83(5) and (6), discussed in Part 2.1, mean that a suit wrongly framed as touching a party’s “internal affairs,” rather than a specific statutory breach, risks being slam a costs with no interim relief available while the matter is pending. It must be noted that this is not a reason to abandon a genuine claim. It is rather, a reason to plead it with precision, squarely within the gateway described below, rather than as a general complaint about unfairness.

3.5 A Narrower but Real Effect:
Methinks that where a party’s primary, or nomination genuinely breached Sections 77 or 84(2), and the breach is a subject of dispute in the eight weeks the Court of Appeal’s decision stood, an aggrieved aspirant now has a considerably stronger hand than he had earlier. Thus, the defence or position that “the sections are unconstitutional” relying on the Court of Appeal’s decision, in some arguments or written submissions, has been taken off the table entirely.

4. The Statutory Gateway and Suggested grounds of infractions:

Before any list of grounds to challenge matter is useful, a reader must understand the door through which those grounds must pass, because Nigerian electoral law does not give every aggrieved person a key to the courtroom, and the Electoral Act 2026 has even made that door narrower and more dangerous to knock on, carelessly, than its predecessor.

Two provisions govern this gateway, and they must be read side by side.

The first is Section 83(5) and (6), described in Part 2.1 above, a broad ouster of jurisdiction over any suit touching a party’s internal affairs, backed by mandatory costs exist. The second, and the one that actually opens the door for a genuine aspirant, is Section 88(2), which provides to the effect that ‘notwithstanding the provisions of the Act or the rules of a political party, an aspirant who complains that any of the provisions of the Act and the guidelines of a political party have not been complied with in the selection or nomination of a candidate may apply to the Federal High Court for redress.’

Section 88 does not stop there, and the remaining two subsections matter as much as the second. Section 88(3) provides that where a court finds a party failed to comply with the Act in the conduct of its primaries, that party’s candidate for the election in question shall not be included in the election for that position. This is a direct and severe statutory remedy, distinct from anything a court might have fashioned for itself or contemplated. Section 88(4) then draws a firm boundary around that power. It must be observed that nothing in the section empowers a court to stop the holding of primaries or general elections pending the determination of a suit. This means that a genuine claimant can only get his rival’s candidacy struck out after the fact. He generally cannot get the primary or the election itself halted while he argues his case.

Reading Sections 83 and 88 together, the position is this. A complaint that amounts to nothing more than “my party’s internal politics were unfair to me” falls within the general ouster in Section 83(5), and pursuing it risks failure and the punitive costs regime in Section 83(6). Even if one argues that, part of section 83 has been once set aside by the Court, that notwithstanding, cost follows event. ZLP got 2million cost, remember.

It is submitted that
a complaint that identifies, with precision, a specific failure to comply with a provision of the Act itself, such as the register requirements in Section 77, the nomination method requirement in Section 84(2), the consensus formalities in Section 87, or the substitution and withdrawal formalities in Sections 31 and 33, and other provisions of the Act or Constitution, falls within the narrower, specific gateway Section 88(2) preserves, and should be pleaded as such, expressly and from the first line of the originating process, and even before the court or tribunal, precisely to keep it out of Section 83’s reach.

Even within that narrower gateway, it must be noted that locus standi or standing remains restricted to an aspirant, and more specifically, as the Court has held that only an aspirant who actually participated in a primary process can be heard to complain. In WAZIRI V. PDP & ANOR (2022) JELR 110137 (SC), the Supreme Court dismissed the Appeal even though the Appellant, he had indicated sufficient interest, and had been screened by the Party’s Primary Appeal panel, but later screened out before the primary and never participated in it. The Supreme Court held that courts lack jurisdiction in intra-party disputes involving screening and exclusion from primaries except where the aggrieved member participated in the primary election itself. Thus, only an aspirant who participated in the primary can challenge it. See Daniel V. INEC (2015) 9 NWLR (Pt 1463) 113.
Relying on the above, it submitted that an aspirant who was cleared to participate but instead of participating in the original primary or a re-run, but, rather choose not to participate or went ahead to staged a rival, factional primary of his own, does so at his own peril, and cannot later be heard under this provision to complain about the very primary he avoided or failed to participate in. Such a person would be deemed not to have participated in the primary at all and therefore lacks the locus standi to sue.

The Lesson:
The lesson for every reader is therefore twofold. First, know that you must be an aspirant who actually took part in the process you are complaining of, not a supporter or an intending aspirant or intending candidate, and definitely not a defector who arrived afterward. And not even a cleared aspirant who boycotted the primary in protest. Second, and new to this edition, know that how your complaint or petition is framed will always determine alot. A precisely pleaded breach of Section 77, 84(2), 87, 31, 33, or other sections of the Act or the Constitution stands inside Section 88(2)’s gateway. However, a generally worded grievance about party unfairness stands, instead, on the wrong side of Section 83, and that is now an expensive place to stand. It is likely going to suffer one fate, that is, it will crumble like a pack of cards.

5. Suggested Infractions and Grounds on Which a Candidacy May Be Challenged, Once Standing Is Established:

Aside the already recognised grounds provided by the Electoral Act, which were captured in my earlier publications, below are some infractions to consider distilling for determination.

5.1 Candidate’s Name Absent From the Register Filed With INEC.
Where it can be established that a candidate name is not in the Register filed with INEC, that is an infraction worthy of consideration. Let the court decide whether this is fundamental and goes to the root or a mere misnomer.

Illustration: Assuming Party Z filed its register with INEC on 1 July. Chief Okoro’s name is absent from that filing, yet Party Z later paraded him as its primary winner and candidate. This, seems to breach Section 77(5) and (6) the Electoral Act.

5.2 Candidate Forwarded to INEC Does Not Correspond to the Party’s Own List.

Illustration: Let’s assume the list filed by Party Z has fifty names. The candidate forwarded as flagbearer is a fifty first name appearing nowhere on it. This is the precise mischief Section 77(6) also targets.

5.3 Party Fields a Candidate Before Submitting Its Register Within the Section 77(4) Deadline.

Illustration: Assuming Party W has filed no register with INEC yet has forwarded a candidate’s name. It is submitted that Section 77(7) renders the entire party ineligible to field any candidate.

5.4 Candidate Substituted Without Meeting the Death or Withdrawal Threshold, or Without a Fresh Primary.

Illustration: Party Y drops its validly nominated candidate and substitutes another, citing only “realignment of interests.” No death or Section 31 compliant withdrawal is shown, and no fresh primary is held within fourteen days. This breaches Section 33 at the threshold, independent of any inquiry into cogent reasons.

5.5 A Claimed “Withdrawal” That Was Never Executed as Section 31 Requires.

Illustration: A party announces its candidate has “withdrawn.” But no written notice signed by the candidate exists, no sworn affidavit was personally delivered, and the candidate denies ever withdrawing.
This fails Section 31 on its face.

5.6 Candidate’s Name Remains on a Rival Party’s List Without Documented Withdrawal.

Illustration: Assuming Hon. Musa’s name appears on Party B’s filed register. However, in August, without documented withdrawal under Section 31, Party A parades him as its own flagbearer or candidate. It is submitted that section 35 renders such a nomination void on its face, a position reinforced by Ugwumba Uche Nwosu v. Action Peoples Party v.(SC. 1384/2019).

5.7 Candidate Was Not Actually a Member at the Material Time.

Illustration: Assuming Mr Ayo is announced as “consensus candidate” in June, but only get registered and obtained his membership card in August, after the register was already filed under Section 77(4) and the process concluded. This breaches Section 77(5) on its clearest terms.

5.8 Nomination Process Falls Outside Direct Primaries or Consensus.

Illustration: Assuming Party F’s candidate emerges through a hybrid delegate system fitting neither category. Neither a direct primary or a consensus. This breaches Section 84(2).

6. Further Issues That May Be Raised for Consideration:

6.1 A Consensus Candidate Adopted Without the Written Consent of Every Cleared Aspirant.
Section 87(1) requires a party adopting a consensus candidate to secure the written consent of every cleared aspirant for that position, each consent indicating voluntary withdrawal and endorsement of the consensus candidate.

Illustration: Party G announces Candidate P as its “consensus candidate.” Two other cleared aspirants never signed anything of the kind, and one publicly denies agreeing to step down.

6.2 A Party That Failed to Secure Consensus and Did Not Revert to a Primary. Section 87(2) requires a party unable to obtain every cleared aspirant’s written consent to revert to direct primaries, the Act prescribed no other option or fallback.

Illustration: Party G fails to secure one aspirant’s consent yet proceeds to announce its preferred candidate anyway, without conducting any primary at all.

6.3 A Consensus Candidate Never Ratified at a Special Convention or Congress. Section 87(3) requires that even a genuinely consented consensus choice still be ratified at a special convention or nomination congress at the designated level, national, state, senatorial or constituency, as the office requires.

Illustration: Party F obtains every signature but never convenes the required congress.

6.4 A Register Filed With INEC That Was Altered, Backdated, or Compiled After the Section 77(4) Cutoff.

Illustration: Party H’s register shows a filing date in early July, yet internal correspondence shows the list actually used for the August primary was finalised several weeks later.

6.5 A Candidate Whose Nomination Form Particulars Do Not Match the Register.

Illustration: The register lists a candidate under one ward and membership number, while the nomination form filed with INEC carries a different ward and number entirely, with no documented transfer of membership. Or the candidate particulars doesn’t match, or correspond with the particulars on the Register submitted to INEC.

6.6 A Party’s Own Unresolved Faction Dispute at the Time of the Primary. Where two rival excos each purport to have organised a primary or filed a register, the issue of which Register or list is the authentic one that should produce an authentic candidate should be put into consideration and decided. If one register is considered non-authentic, it means candidates under such register also suffers a defect, except regularised or such candidate’s name is also in the authentic register.

7. Conclusion
All the above are suggested issues and infractions for consideration.

Conclusively, the Supreme Court judgment is not a fresh start for anyone who missed a deadline. It is not a door held open for the defector, the late entrant, or the aspirant hoping a court in Abuja has solved his local problem for him. It is a confirmation that Sections 77(5) to (7) and 84(2) of the Electoral Act 2026, as actually written, remain the rules. An aggrieved party should examine the rules, and ensure that his grievances fall under what the rules permit and not mere academic exercise or internal affairs of his/her party.