OWN CORRESPONDENT, Abuja | Tuesday, 10.30PM.
TEN political groups in Nigeria have collected party registration forms from the Independent National Electoral Commission, the commission said on Tuesday.
Nigeria’s timetable for a return to democratic government, announced last week by INEC chairman Justice Ephraim Akpata, calls for all political associations to register with the electoral commission by September 9.
The registration of the parties will be in two stages. All political associations will be allowed to contest local government elections on December 5, but for full registration, a party needs to score at least 10% of votes cast in 24 of the 36 states of the federation at the local government level.
The electoral commission, sworn in last month by Nigerian leader General Abdulsalam Abubakar, also plans a two-week registration of voters to begin on 5 October.
The 10 parties include the National Democratic Party, the Congress Alliance, the National Restoration Democratic Party, Agenda ’99 and the Minority Rights Party. Others are the People’s Democratic Party, led by Dr Alex Ekwueme, vice-president of the third republic aborted by the military in December 1983, the All People’s Party, the National Renaissance Party and the Community Party of Nigeria. Another group led by Paul Unaogu, a minister of the third republic, has the same name of People’s Democratic Party.
* A report from Lagos says that eight delegates of the People’s Democratic Party have been killed in a road accident. The reports did not specify which of the two PDPs the delegates belonged to. The politicians were on their way from Jos, in the north, to the capital, Abuja, to attend the official launch of their party when their minibus collided with another vehicle.