The Movement for Credible Elections (MCE) has picked holes in the reviewed 2026 Regulations and Guidelines for Political Parties released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Abuja on Tuesday.

MCE in a statement by its Head of Secretariat, Olawale Okunniyi, described the guidelines as expansion of regulatory overreach into the internal affairs of political parties.

The movement warned that by attempting to rigidly regulate candidate selection processes, INEC risks undermining the constitutional right to freedom of association and eroding internal party democracy rather than strengthening it. It aligned with the concerns raised by the InterParty Advisory Council (IPAC) that the imposition of a restrictive framework, particularly around primary elections, could trigger avoidable disputes, weaken party structures and further alienate grassroots participants from the democratic process.

MCE pointed out that the requirement for political parties to submit comprehensive membership registers, including National Identification Numbers (NINs), within a short compressed timeframe, is not only impractical but fundamentally exclusionary.

“In a country where millions of eligible citizens still remain outside the national identity database, such provisions risk disenfranchising legitimate party members and disproportionately disadvantage smaller parties. “This is not reform; it is systemic exclusion disguised as electoral reforms,” the group stated. It also kicked against the commission’s “compressed timetable”, saying it raises serious red flags.

According to the group, electoral integrity cannot be achieved under administrative pressure. It added that complex processes such as party primaries, candidate verification and compliance audits require adequate time to ensure accuracy and fairness. “Rushed timelines will inevitably produce errors, shoddiness, disputes, and litigation—further eroding public trust in the process,” the MCE asserted.

It expressed worry at INEC’s continued silence over the mandatory electronic transmission of election results which, according to the group, is the single most critical demand of the Nigerian electorate and a decisive factor in rebuilding electoral trust in Nigeria. The movement stated that any regulatory framework that fails to guarantee real-time, transparent and verifiable transmission of results from polling units cannot be taken seriously as a tool for electoral credibility