Political parties spent an estimated N19.65 billion during the 2025 Anambra State governorship election, a new report by the Kimpact Development Initiative (KDI) has revealed.

This was disclosed in a report unveiled at a high-level electoral integrity summit organised by the civic group as part of its review of the off-cycle election ahead of the 2027 general elections.

The findings were presented under KDI’s Political Finance Monitoring project, which used a Parallel Expense Tracking methodology involving field observations, media monitoring and cost estimations based on prevailing market rates.

According to the report presented to stakeholders by the Executive Director of KDI, Bukola Idowu, 50 trained monitors were deployed across Anambra State, including eight media monitors and 42 community-based observers, to track campaign activities such as rallies, media advertisements and outdoor materials.

These activities were then matched with prevailing market prices to estimate campaign expenditure. The report, which tracked campaign and election-day activities from June to November 2025, estimated that N19,654,578,441 was spent by political parties during the election cycle.

Of this amount, N8,721,914,600 went into campaign activities, while N10,932,663,841 was deployed for election-day mobilisation, suggesting that a significant share of resources was spent at the decisive moment of voting.

KDI observed that spending during the election was heavily concentrated among three major political parties, while the remaining 13 parties accounted for only a small fraction of the total financial activity.

At the candidate level, the imbalance was even more pronounced. The report also detailed estimated expenditures by the major candidates.

According to the report, Governor Charles Soludo of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) recorded the highest estimated spending, with N4,127,413,520 on campaign activities and N9,148,800,000 on election-day mobilisation.

For Nicholas Ukachukwu of the All Progressives Congress (APC), the estimated spending was N2,049,955,300 during the campaign and N852,998,065 on election day.

George Moghalu of the Labour Party (LP) recorded N2,378,686,800 in campaign expenses and N689,292,532 in election-day mobilisation.

Under Section 88(3) of the Electoral Act 2022, governorship candidates are expected to spend no more than N1 billion on their campaigns.

The report, however, found that enforcing this provision is difficult because campaign operations often involve overlapping financial structures between candidates, political parties and affiliated actors. The study also highlighted a sharp increase in the cost of governorship elections over the past decade.

KDI noted that the rising cost of elections could undermine electoral competitiveness and limit participation to financially powerful actors. While the law recognises third-party donations, KDI noted that there is limited legal clarity on third-party spending, which complicates efforts to regulate campaign finance.

To address these challenges, the organisation recommended that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) develop a unified expenditure reporting template, integrating candidates, party and affiliated campaign structures.

It also urged the National Assembly to amend the Electoral Act to provide a clear statutory definition of third-party spending and establish disclosure thresholds