ABUJA — The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has distributed access codes to nearly all registered political parties in Nigeria, enabling them to begin uploading candidate details onto its Candidate Nomination Portal ahead of the 2027 general elections — with the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) standing out as the only party yet to collect its code as of Tuesday evening.

Newsworld Media Network gathered that the development comes on the heels of widespread public interest over INEC’s decision to extend access to the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), a party currently entangled in a court dispute that had earlier called its registration into question.

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A senior INEC official explained that the commission granted the NDC its access code after taking judicial notice of the party’s appeal against the court ruling and its accompanying application for a stay of execution, stressing that the decision was made without prejudice to the final outcome of the litigation.

“Senator Seriake, their National Leader, claimed they’ve appealed the ruling and applied for a stay of execution. It’s only proper to take judicial notice of their appeal and not deny them the code. Obviously, this is without prejudice to the final outcome of the case,” the official said.

The source made clear that allowing the NDC onto the portal while the matter remains before the courts does not amount to a determination of the legal dispute, and that the commission simply deemed the pending appeal sufficient grounds not to shut the party out of the nomination process at this stage.

Confirming the broader picture, the official disclosed that virtually every registered political party had by Tuesday evening picked up their access codes from the commission — all except the NNPP.

“By the way, I’ve just confirmed that all but NNPP have collected their code,” the source said.

The access code is the gateway through which political parties upload the details of their candidates to INEC’s Candidate Nomination Portal, in line with the commission’s published timetable. The portal, which opened on June 27, 2026, remains active until July 11, 2026, for presidential and National Assembly candidates, and from July 18 to August 8, 2026, for governorship and state assembly hopefuls.

No explanation was immediately available for the NNPP’s absence from the collection exercises