By RismadarVoice Media
December 19, 2025
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has waded into leadership crisis that has been bedeviling the Peoples’ Democratic Party ( PDP), by meeting the two factions within the Nigeria’s leading opposition party, seeking how to end its internal crisis.
The meeting, held at the conference hall at the INEC headquarters in Abuja, presided over by its Chairman, Professor Joash Ojo Amupitan, SAN, had in attendance the two warring factions of the PDP.
The two factions are those led by Barrister Kabiru Turaki and the other one headed by Abdulrahman Mohammed, which has the backing of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike and Senator Samuel Anyanwu.
Barrister Turaki attended the meeting alongside members of his national working committee, secretariat staff and former Niger State Governor, Babangida Aliyu, while Mohammed was accompanied by members of his national caretaker committee, including its secretary, Senator Sam Anyanwu.
Speaking at the opening of the meeting on Friday, Prof. Amupitan, explained that the intervention became necessary, sequel to a series of conflicting correspondence received from the PDP by INEC.
He added that the INEC’s actions were guided strictly by the constitution, the Electoral Act and its internal regulations, assuring the factions of its neutrality.
He said: “As a build-up to these elections, we have issued our own schedule of activities to all the political parties. And we are on course to ensure that we have a very smooth election at the area council of FCT and at Ekiti and Osun States.”
“We have received conflicting correspondence from the PDP, and we felt that rubbing minds together would be a good opportunity to forge the way forward, concerning the elections.”
I’m happy that we have the very top officials that are present here so that we can discuss as a family, see how the issues can be resolved, then we move forward.
We are mindful of the need for us to maintain the sanctity of the Constitution of Nigeria.
INEC sits on a tripod, comprising three legal regimes: the Constitution, the Electoral Act, and the regulations that have been made.
We are determined towards ensuring that we follow the provisions of the various laws, the Constitution and the regulations that we have made.
“Without much ado, I welcome all of you, I request that we have very frank discussions to ensure that we can achieve the objective of this meeting.”
The meeting later went into a closed-door session after the opening speech by Amupitan.
Meanwhile, the faction of the PDP led by Turaki later issued a statement, at the end of the meeting where it expressly declared that it was awaiting the outcome of the court, over the cases that have been instituted over the crisis.
The statement by the Turaki-led faction said, “Earlier, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Prof. Joash Amupitan SAN invited the Kabiru Turaki-led National Working Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party, some former members of our party who are claiming to be in different leadership positions in the party, to in his words; find a way to resolve the lingering crisis in the party.
Both sides exhaustively presented the facts of the situation, confirmed that the issues are now before the Court of Appeal.
At the end, INEC Chairman concluded that the meeting was called to hear from both sides, though the commission is aware of the pending cases at the Court of Appeal and that the Commission awaits the final judgement of the Court on the matter”, it stated.
