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The Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) has advised the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) against going on with its threat to deregister some political parties that participated in the last elections.
National Chairman of IPAC, Peter Ameh, who stated this at a meeting between INEC and political parties’ leaders yesterday in Abuja, noted that deregistering political parties would deprive the parties opportunity to develop their potential, adding that “the more political parties participating in an election, the less post-election violence and bloodshed we have had.”
INEC had few weeks ago vowed to propose further alteration of the conditions for the de-registration of political parties in a bid to weed out dormant platforms with little or no visible structures and presence in any of the states.
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Ameh, however, said instead of INEC deregistering these parties, more stringent measures for registering new political parties should be adopted.
He further sought for the establishment of bodies such as the Political Parties Registration and Regulatory Commission and Electoral Offences Commission.
This, according to him, would allow INEC concentrate solely on elections as its name suggests and therefore driving efficiency in the nation’s electoral system.
Earlier, the Chairman of INEC, Prof. Yakubu Mahmood, decried the conduct of party primaries and nomination of candidates for the 2019 general elections, saying it had resulted in 809 court cases.
He said the deadline of September 5, 2019 for party primaries in Bayelsa and Kogi states governorship elections is firm and fixed, adding that no nomination arising from primaries conducted after the deadline would be accepted by the commission.
