The Federal High Court in Abuja on Wednesday upheld the exclusion of Labour Party (LP) candidates from the upcoming Area Council elections in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
Delivering the judgment, Justice Peter Lifu declined to compel the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to accept and publish the list of LP candidates for the elections scheduled for February 21.
The court dismissed a suit (FHC/ABJ/CS/2110/2025) filed by the LP and its FCT candidates against INEC.
The plaintiffs had argued that when INEC published its final list of candidates in September 2025, the LP’s duly nominated candidates were unlawfully left out.
The LP further told the court that on September 8, 2025, it wrote a letter to the Chairman of INEC to complain about the exclusion of not just the names of its nominated candidates but also the omission of its logo from the manifest of political parties that will partake in the FCT election.
It decried that another letter to INEC on October 2, 2025, over the same issue, was ignored by the Commission.
LP pleaded that unless the court intervened, it would be unjustly excluded from fielding candidates in the impending FCT Council poll.
Meanwhile, in his judgement on Wednesday, Justice Lifu stressed that the case of the plaintiff, under the 1999 Constitution, fell under pre-election litigation.
The court noted that none of the parties disputed the fact that whereas the suit was filed on October 7, 2025, the cause of action, which was the exclusion of LP candidates by INEC, occurred on October 22, 2025.
It held that section 285 of paragraph 14(c) of the 1999 Constitution, as amended, clearly stipulated that such a pre-election matter must be filed within 14 days after the cause of action arose.
