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From Romanus Ugwu, Abuja
The ongoing All Progressives Congress (APC) membership e-registration exercise across the country has dominated the political landscape in the build-up to the 2027 general election.
East, West, North and South, the ruling party’s membership registration and revalidation exercise is clearly the subject and topic of political discussions in most parts of the country.
Reported in both positive and negative perspectives, the exercise has really gained massive traction with the media attention it has generated so far since the beginning of this year.
Every member and chieftain of the APC has not only shown high-level enthusiasm and willingness to be in the vanguard of propelling the exercise and spreading the ‘gospel’, but also shown the determination to fish for reluctant or indecisive members of the party and mobilise them through the exercise.
Surprisingly, revalidation, renewal, e-registration, or whatever name those at the helm of the ruling party decide to brand and rebrand it, the exercise has become a recurring decimal undertaken by almost all the successive national leaderships of the party.
In retrospect, during the administration of John Odigie-Oyegun as national chairman of the party, attempts were made to compile the names of members of the party under one register, but the exercise regrettably died a natural death.
Again, when the governor of Yobe State, Mai Mala-Buni, took charge of the affairs of the party in the status of chairman Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee, he resurrected the exercise, pushed it to a very large extent before his successor, Abdullahi Adamu, replaced him.
Governor Buni’s efforts failed to achieve the intended result largely because of the hostility from party chieftains and doubts over the manual compilation of the register, in addition to the belief that it was principally manipulated.
Surprisingly, the hostility against the exercise apparently came from his predecessors, former governors Chief Bisi Akande and Comrade Senator Adams Oshiomhole, who tenaciously declared the exercise unconstitutional.
Stoutly opposing the exercise, Akande, the pioneer Interim National Chairman of the party, had described the decision of the Buni-led Caretaker Committee to embark on a fresh membership registration as an aberration.
Akande had insisted that “No population census is repeated within less than a decade, and voters are not re-registered at every election. Within this context, I see the present APC membership registration within less than a decade after the original registration as an indefensible aberration leading to certain ugly perceptions.
“The first major perception is that APC, already having a well computerised register for an average of 100 leaders of similar ideological orientation in each of the 120,000 polling units across Nigeria, might be lacking comprehension and matrix of modern-day technology.
“The second major perception is that APC leadership might be wasteful and unappreciative of the proper use of money in a kind of scanty economy in which Nigeria now finds itself.
“These seemingly ugly perceptions put into abeyance the applause of the national election successes that the original APC register enjoyed since its completion on 15th February 2014, and the over one billion Naira of 2014’s value that the original register cost when APC had no money of its own,” Chief Akande had argued.
And pitching a tent with Chief Akande in faulting the legitimacy and legality of the programme, Comrade Oshiomhole claimed that the revalidation of membership of the party contradicts the APC’s constitution, insisting that it was tantamount to double registration.
“APC is governed by the constitution and not by man. The constitution only provides for registration, and I registered as a member of the APC in 2014 under the interim national chairman, Chief Akande. There is nothing in the APC constitution that says a member shall revalidate or renew its membership.
“Once you register when you join the party, and you have not decamped, you are a member. So, revalidation is strange to our constitution. I had to do this because I want peace to reign, but in doing this, we have to be careful not to create a constitutional breach,” he had warned then.
Pushing his argument further, Oshiomhole said: “If you ask me as a foundation member who has never decamped, to revalidate my membership, it is double registration, because there is nothing like revalidation in our constitution.
“Asking me to revalidate my membership means I was not a member when I have never left the party. I think the correct language should be either reviewing or updating, because it makes sense to review the voters’ register due to the new members that have joined or those that have exited,” he argued.
Curiously, despite the hostility, the subsequent leadership of the ruling party was not, however, deterred from embarking on similar projects. Little wonder Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje resurrected the exercise during his reign as the national chairman of the ruling party.
Though he could not go very far before he was shoved out of the system, today, the resumption and approach of Prof. Nentawe Goshwe Yilwatda-led national leadership, which renewed the membership revalidation exercise, has been entirely different in dimension and veracity.
Although there have not been dissenting voices against the legality and legitimacy of the exercise so far, there has, however, been some level of scepticism in many quarters over the real intentions of the current exercise, with many harbouring doubts that the APC intends to deploy it as a political campaign instrument for the forthcoming 2027 presidential election.
But, regardless of whatever might be the real intentions, the party’s national and state leaderships and chieftains have given the exercise wide publicity and acceptability.
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If the NWC members are not addressing the media, the incumbent governors are flagging off the exercise in their various states, branding it with all kinds of different names. They have also used the exercise as opportunities to campaign by confirming their acceptability through reciting the now popular campaign mantra of standing on their mandates or singing, “na our papa be this, we no get another one…”
For some governors, it was time to even go the extra mile to prove the magnitude of importance attached to the exercise by dangling mouth-watering carrots at party members, promising a handsome package to the Local Government Areas (LGAs) with the highest number of registrants.
A typical example was in Benue State, where the governor, Hyacinth Alia, while flagging off the exercise, said: “This is the beginning of another level of progression of the APC. It is something that has not happened with any political party in Nigeria. It is an apt bragging right. Because the e-registration would help the party accurately determine its strength at the ward, local government, and state levels.
“Unlike the 2023 voter registration, the APC e-registration is designed to showcase party membership, seriousness, and direction clearly. That is why the party leadership took time to train the registration personnel before deploying them across the state.
“I want the whole of Nigeria and the world o know that when we say Benue State is APC, we are ready to demonstrate it by action, backed by facts and reality on the ground. My administration will give priority attention to the most registered areas because this is an APC administration,” he promised.
But, for other governors, the exercise has become a terroristic instrument to harass, intimidate the oppositions and more curiously to authenticate the controversial, contentious debate of who is actually the genuine leader of the party in the states.
That perhaps might be the reason many governors have used it to send warning messages to their detractors that their numbers in the register have given them the bragging right as they announced before cameras that they have revalidated their membership with 001 as their card numbers.
Though the exercise has recorded tremendous successes, it however left to be seen if it will hit the intended target of 12.5 million members by February 8, 2026.
Curiously, there have also been some controversies over allegations of seizures and unconfirmed destruction of the voters’ cards of those who participated in the exercise, in addition to the suspicious demand for compulsory presentation of NIN and Voter Identification Number as a prerequisite for completing the registration.
However, while speaking on the controversial request for the items as a prerequisite for completion of the registration, the party’s National Secretary, Senator Ajibola Basiru, had defended it, claiming that for gathered data to be authenticated, they must have NIN support.
Appraising the exercise, particularly the controversy, Senator Basiru said: “The e-registration is based on two essential requirements. You must have a NIN and a Voter Identification Number. Yes, it has been challenging for some people, but they are essentials we must have for several reasons. One, our NIN is the basis for any data by law in Nigeria. So, for any data to be gathered, you must have NIN to support it. In fact, INEC ought to start looking at having the voter’s register to be NIN-based. APC is ahead of even INEC in terms of complying with the law.
“NIN is the basis for any financial inclusion. You cannot operate and have a bank account without a NIN. What APC is doing is to make our members financially inclusive so that they will have access. When you have been able to do NIN, it makes it easier for you to engage. Then all other intervention by international organisations and by the country is based on the NIN.
“We are making our members compliant with the law, be engaged effectively in terms of financial inclusion, and to prepare them for whatever programmes the national government will do,” he explained.
Equally defending the request for voter registration, Senator Basiru said: “As for the voter registration, how can you be a member of a political party without being a registered voter? The best way you simplify support for your party is your ability to vote. Those two requirements are mandatory, and they have been complied with.”
And perhaps apparently rattled by the widespread use of the membership card belonging to the notorious terrorist, Bello Turji, discrediting the exercise, the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka, in the statement he signed, described it as fake.
“Our attention has been drawn to a fake ‘APC membership slip’ in circulation on social media falsely suggesting that a despicable and notorious terrorist, Bello Turji, was registered as a member of our party in the ongoing APC electronic registration and validation exercise.
“The membership slip is a fabrication, fake, and without any association or link whatsoever with our membership register and database. All digital parameters represented on the fake slip bear no connection to our party’s membership register.
“This vile fabrication is the handiwork of mischief makers out to hoodwink and confuse members of the public for their own sinister objectives. We urge all party faithful and the general public to disregard the highly offensive document in its entirety,” the APC noted in the statement.
But, beyond the negatives associated with the exercise and before the real motive of brandishing the figure as both campaign weapon and bragging right, the party’s chief scribe, in his general appraisal of the exercise, had claimed that it is more or less a win-win situation for the ruling party.
He stressed that the “APC e-registration has been tremendously successful, and that is why we are extending the deadline. We have received requests from many states that there are so many members who are still eager to register.
“And based on that request, particularly from the Governors’ Forum at the meeting we held with them recently, the NWC decided to extend, so that there will not be mischief to say APC extended registration because of lack of a response.
“We are extending because there were requests from the stakeholders in the states and from our body of governors, and because we also know that there are thousands, as of today, who are ready to register for our party. The size of APC members today is more than the population of as many as 100 countries in the world, including some countries in Africa. APC is larger than many countries.
“As of now, contrary to the target of seven million, we have crossed that mark, and by the time we are closing on February 8, we should have crossed the mark of 12.5 million,” Senator Basiru noted while announcing the postponement of the initially deadline for the exercise in Abuja last week.
