The Julius Abure-led leadership of the Labour Party has rejected claims that the Independent National Electoral Commission is opposed to its continued stay in office, describing the reports as misleading and deliberately twisted to deceive the public.
The party made the clarification in a statement issued on Saturday in Abuja by its National Publicity Secretary, Obiora Ifoh, in reaction to comments credited to a faction aligned with Abia State Governor, Alex Otti, and Senator Nenadi Usman.
Abure said the statement attributed to Senator Darlington Nwokocha, whom he described as a suspended member, falsely suggested that INEC’s recent actions were aimed at questioning the legitimacy of the party’s national leadership.
According to him, INEC’s decision to withhold access codes ahead of the February 18 FCT Area Council election was solely based on unresolved legal issues surrounding the council polls and had nothing to do with the leadership structure of the Labour Party.
The party insisted that the electoral body merely opted to await the conclusion of pending court cases before taking further steps, stressing that the situation was wrongly interpreted by what it called an “illegal and non-existent caretaker committee.”
Abure further maintained that there was no leadership vacuum at the party’s national secretariat, adding that the relationship between INEC and the Labour Party had been normalised under the current leadership of the commission.
He also pointed to several engagements between the party and INEC, including participation in consultative meetings, electoral processes ahead of the Ekiti and Osun governorship elections, and the monitoring of the party’s NEC meetings and congresses across the country.
The statement urged members of the rival faction to move on, arguing that the exit of the party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Peter Obi, to the African Democratic Congress had rendered their agitation irrelevant.
The clarification followed the endorsement of Governor Otti as Labour Party leader by the Nenadi Usman-led faction, a move that has further deepened the internal crisis within the party since the conclusion of the 2023 general election.