Court Orders INEC to Restore Adebutu as Ogun PDP Governorship Candidate

The Federal High Court in Abuja has ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission to immediately restore and publish the name of Hon. Ladi Adebutu as the Peoples Democratic Party governorship candidate for Ogun State in the 2027 general election.

The judgment, delivered on Friday, November 13, 2026, by Justice Peter Lifu, gave the electoral commission a strict 24-hour deadline to comply and resolved all four major issues in favour of Adebutu, ValidViewNetwork reports .

THE JUDGMENT: FOUR ISSUES, ONE VERDICT

Justice Lifu’s ruling dismantled INEC’s defence piece by piece, resolving four critical issues in the PDP candidate’s favour.

First, on INEC’s claim that Adebutu was affected by an earlier Supreme Court judgment regarding party primaries, the court held that Adebutu was not a party to that suit.

Consequently, he could not be bound by its outcome. The Supreme Court ruling relied upon by INEC did not apply to him .

Second, on INEC’s power to remove candidates, the court ruled that the electoral commission cannot unilaterally delete or remove a candidate sponsored by a political party without first approaching a court of competent jurisdiction.

INEC is an umpire, not a judge .

Third, the court questioned INEC’s decision to raise the issue of Adebutu’s name several months after the relevant processes had been concluded.

Justice Lifu described the delay as an “absurdity”.

Fourth, on the contentious PDP membership register, the court noted that INEC had monitored the party’s governorship primary and subsequently published Adebutu’s name among its provisional list of candidates.

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It held that the PDP had sufficiently established Adebutu’s membership of the party in Ogun State, while INEC failed to provide convincing evidence that the electronic copy of the register submitted by the PDP had been altered .

THE BACKGROUND

The legal battle began after INEC omitted Adebutu’s name from its final list of 13 governorship candidates published on October 10, 2026 .

The PDP and Adebutu approached the court on October 22, 2026, through their counsel, Ahmed Raji, SAN, seeking an order to compel INEC to publish Adebutu’s name as the party’s governorship candidate.

INEC’s defence, contained in a counter-affidavit deposed to by Mustapha Mohammed, a Chief Programme Analyst in its ICT Department, was that Adebutu’s name was not in the membership register submitted by the PDP.

The commission claimed it found only the name of the deputy governorship candidate, Kolapo Lateefat Oyeyemi, in the register, and that serial number 1536, which the PDP claimed belonged to Adebutu, actually belonged to one Lugboso Sunday Seun .

The PDP, through its National Organising Secretary, Umar Bature, disputed INEC’s position, insisting that Adebutu’s name was included in the flash drive submitted to the commission.

THE PERJURY ALLEGATION

The case was not without controversy. A Labour Party chieftain, Arabambi Abayomi, accused Adebutu of perjury, alleging that he falsely claimed ownership of membership serial number 1536 in the affidavit filed in support of his suit against INEC.

Abayomi called on the Attorney-General of the Federation to investigate the matter .The allegation did not sway the court.

WHY IT MATTERS

This is a significant victory for Adebutu and the PDP, but it is also a significant moment for Nigeria’s electoral jurisprudence.

Justice Lifu’s ruling reaffirms a principle that should be obvious but is often tested in Nigeria’s political arena: INEC cannot disqualify a candidate.

Only the courts can do that.

If the commission believes a candidate has violated the law, its recourse is to seek a court order, not to act unilaterally.

The ruling also exposes the weakness of INEC’s position. The commission’s defence rested on a technical claim about a membership register.

The court did not accept that this technicality justified the removal of a candidate who had been duly nominated by his party.

For Adebutu, the judgment is a vindication. He has spent weeks insisting that he was duly registered and that his nomination was valid. The court has now agreed.

For INEC, the ruling is a rebuke. It is a reminder that the commission’s actions are subject to judicial review, and that it cannot act as judge, jury, and executioner in the electoral process.

The judgment has been delivered. Adebutu’s name must be restored within 24 hours. And the 2027 Ogun governorship race has been reset. ValidViewNetwork reports.

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