Eighteen (18) out of the 91 registered political parties will not be fielding presidential candidates in Saturday’s elections.
These parties are:
Congress of Patriots (COP)
Alternative Party of Nigeria (APN)
Legacy Party of Nigeria (LPN)
Modern Democratic Party (MDP)
Movement for The Restoration and Defence of Democracy (MRDD)
New Generation Party (NGP)
New Progressives Movement (NPM)
Alliance for Democracy (AD)
Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM)
Peoples Progressives Party (PPP)
Socialist Party of Nigeria (SPN)
United Progressives Party UPP)
Young Democratic Party (YDP)
Youth Party (YP)
Zenith Labour Party (ZLP)
Democratic Alternative (DA)
There are 91 registered political parties, out of which 73 parties are fielding presidential candidates, leaving 18 political parties not fielding presidential candidates.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on January 17 released its final list of presidential candidates.
Among the 73 candidates, two parties; the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN) have issues although both parties are listed on INEC’s final list.
ACPN has its name and the name of its candidate on INEC’s list but the party’s presidential candidate, Oby Ezekwesili, withdrew from the race even though the deadline for withdrawal and substitution had elapsed.
SDP, on the other hand, has only its party name on INEC’s list because the party failed to send the name of its candidate, due to court cases.