- The commission is currently reviewing the submitted applications to ascertain which of the associations meet the criteria to advance to the formal application stage.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) says it has now received 144 applications for the registration of new political parties.
This is even as the electoral umpire announced the deployment of its newly built political party registration portal, following successful internal testing and approval.
The commission made this known in a statement on Thursday by its National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, Sam Olumekun.
According to Olumekun, the commission is currently reviewing the submitted applications to ascertain which of the associations meet the criteria to advance to the formal application stage.
“The Commission is evaluating all the numerous letters of intent received so far to determine the associations that meet the requirements to proceed to the application stage. A report is expected at our next regular meeting,” the statement said.
INEC also confirmed that the registration portal was designed and built internally by its Information and Communications Technology (ICT) department.
“In our last press release, we assured Nigerians that we were finalising the necessary tests on the party registration portal designed and built in-house by our ICT officials,” Olumekun said.
“As is the case with all our IT innovations, the new portal has been demonstrated before the Commission and approved for deployment.”
He added that details of the newly received applications, including the names, acronyms, logos, addresses, and interim leadership of the groups, have been published on the commission’s website and other platforms for public access.
“We will continue to update Nigerians on all our activities,” the statement concluded