Citing stringent membership registration requirements under the Electoral Act, Senator Nenadi Usman, the interim national chairman of the Labour Party, has said that Peter Obi, the party’s 2023 presidential candidate, will be constitutionally prohibited from running on the party’s platform in the 2027 election.
In an interview with Arise TV on Wednesday, Usman revealed that the party’s register would be closed 21 days prior to the primaries and sent in to the Independent National Electoral Commission.
She said, “Well, if you look at the act now, we close the register at some point, so it will be too late for him to come back.”
“You cannot come from behind the door to register and run for office until we close the register 21 days prior to the primary and submit the register, the e-register, to INEC. That would not be feasible, at least not legally.
Usman admitted that Obi had played a significant role in the party’s 2023 surge, but she claimed that the former governor of Anambra had convinced her to switch from the Peoples Democratic Party to the Labour Party before the most recent general election.
He even persuaded me to accompany him to the Labour Party. convinced me, and many members of the Labour Party today were also persuaded by, let’s join Peter, go to Labour Party because we believed in equity and fair play,” she said.
She said her decision to leave the PDP was rooted in the belief that the party had failed to zone its presidential ticket to the south.
Usman said, “We believe that PDP should have zoned the seat to the south. But since they left it open and said there were no zoning and a northerner, they were trying to field a northerner, we felt no, it’s not fair. Though I’m a northerner but I felt it was not fair.”
Since its successful 2023 campaign, the LP has been mired in a protracted leadership struggle.
Usman’s caretaker committee and the camp of former national chairman Julius Abure, whose faction accused the caretaker group of an unauthorized coup, were at odds over conflicting claims to the national leadership.
After the Supreme Court declared in April 2025 that Abure’s term had ended, a Federal High Court in Abuja dismissed him and mandated that INEC recognize Usman’s committee as the only lawful leadership while a national convention was being held.
Following allegations of document theft and damage against Abure loyalists, Usman’s group assumed control of the party’s national secretariat in Utako, Abuja.
Abure’s case was recently rejected by the Abuja Court of Appeal, which unanimously upheld Usman’s temporary chairmanship and ordered INEC to engage only with her faction.
The legal battle remains unsolved as Abure has stated he will file an appeal with the Supreme Court.
The party has suffered greatly as a result of the crisis, including widespread defections, a diminished presence in the National Assembly, and a weakened grassroots organization.
Obi himself stated that his choice to depart was influenced by the protracted internal conflict. Since then, Usman’s group has started the process of revalidating memberships and has moved the party’s 2027 presidential ticket to the south.
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