The Court of Appeal in Abuja has overturned the judgment that directed the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to deregister the African Democratic Congress (ADC) and four other political parties accused of failing to meet constitutional requirements for continued existence.
In a unanimous decision by a three-member panel of justices, the appellate court held that the order issued by the Federal High Court on June 15 amounted to a nullity, ruling that the lower court had wrongly assumed jurisdiction and acted on a suit filed by a non-juristic entity.
According to the appellate court, there was no valid suit that could have warranted the consequential order directing INEC to strip the parties of their recognition.
The court noted that the trial court had failed to properly weigh the evidence before it, including proof that the affected parties had won various seats in previous elections. It also held that the high court had acted in defiance of an earlier order directing it to stay proceedings in the matter, and that it ought to have dismissed the substantive case for want of jurisdiction and merit.
In its lead judgment delivered by Justice Abba Mohammed, the appellate court declared all affected political parties duly registered and allowed the separate appeals they had filed. It also awarded monetary costs against the National Forum of Former Legislators (NFFL), which had brought the case against them.
Apart from the ADC, the other parties whose registration was restored are the Action Peoples Party (APP), Action Alliance (AA), Accord Party (AP) and the Zenith Labour Party (ZLP).
The appellate court had previously ordered a stay of execution of the high court judgment on June 16, while also rebuking the trial judge for disregarding the judicial hierarchy.
The panel strongly criticised Justice Peter Lifu of the Federal High Court in Abuja for flouting its May 22 order directing him to stay proceedings pending the outcome of the parties’ appeals. It noted that even after his attention had been drawn to the order, he deliberately ignored it and proceeded to deliver judgment.
The court described Justice Lifu’s conduct as “a form of judicial impertinence,” recalling that the Supreme Court had previously held that a judge who acts in such a manner “is unfit for the bench, as the conduct amounts to judicial rascality.”
The high court had earlier directed INEC to deregister the five parties, barred the electoral body from accepting their candidates’ nominations and ordered the parties to stop presenting themselves as registered political parties — all on the grounds that they had persistently failed to meet the constitutional benchmarks required to retain their registration.
The NFFL, in its suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/2637/2026, had asked the court to determine whether INEC had a constitutional obligation to remove parties that failed to meet the electoral performance thresholds set out in Section 225A of the 1999 Constitution, as reinforced by the Electoral Act 2022 and INEC’s own regulations.
The former legislators argued that the requirements — including winning at least 25 per cent of the votes in a state during a presidential election or securing at least one elective seat at any tier of government — had not been met by any of the five defendants.
Notably, the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Prince Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), who was named as a defendant, sided with the plaintiffs, arguing that the continued existence of the parties violated the 1999 Constitution and undermined the nation’s electoral integrity.
All the defendants, including INEC, had appealed the high court’s verdict, and the appellate court has now ruled in their favour.