‘Blatant Lie’ – Nafiu Bala ADC Faction Has Not Uploaded Candidates To INEC Portal – Abdullahi

The National Publicity Secretary of the African Democratic Congress (APC), led by Senator David Mark, Bolaji Abdullahi, has debunked claims that the faction led by Nafiu Bala Gombe, has uploaded candidates to the nomination portal of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for the 2027 election.

Abdullahi made the denial in a statement on Monday in which he argued that INEC can not issue codes for nomination or upload to a party faction it does not recognize.

According to him, the claim by Gombe is a blatant lie, and for verification purpose, Gombe should provide evidence of the upload by his group.

Naija News reports that the statement comes hours after the ADC faction led by Gombe claimed it had uploaded the credentials of its presidential, vice-presidential, and national assembly candidates to the INEC portal.

He made the claim in a statement issued on Sunday, but failed to provide details of the faction’s candidates whose names were submitted to the commission’s portal.

On Monday, Abdullahi denounced the claim, and called on INEC to investigate the claim and avoid any confusion.

The statement reads, “The African Democratic Congress (ADC) wishes to draw the attention of the media and the general public to false reports claiming that a group led by Mr. Nafiu Bala Gombe has uploaded the names of a presidential candidate and other nominees to the INEC nomination portal. The claim is a blatant lie. And it is quite easy to verify why.

“INEC does not issue nomination portal access or nomination codes to a leadership it does not recognise. Secondly, the Commission will not issue two codes to the same party.

“Otherwise, every impostor would simply upload names to the portal and proclaim themselves the authentic leadership of a political party. That is plainly not how the law or the Commission’s processes work.

“The question, therefore, is straightforward: where is the evidence of this purported upload by a group of individuals not known by law or the electoral body?

“We are also, by this statement, formally drawing the attention of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to what appears to be the forgery and unauthorised use of documents purportedly emanating from the Commission in a manner capable of creating confusion and undermining public confidence in its integrity and reputation as Nigeria’s electoral umpire.

“We trust that the Commission will investigate this matter and take the necessary steps to correct this blatant misrepresentation.”