The claim that the ADC “may be deregistered” under Section 225A pursuant to the suit by the Former National Legislators Forum is not just baseless and speculative, it is legally illiterate and scare mongering. It betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of both the structure and operation of the Constitution and the duty of the courts.
First, on competence which is locus standi: the suit is dead on arrival. Section 225A vests the power of deregistration exclusively in INEC. That power is administrative, discretionary, and triggered only upon INEC’s own constitutional evaluation of facts. It is not a roving mandate for private litigants to activate through judicial adventurism. Any attempt by a private entity to procure deregistration through the courts is a constitutional aberration.
On settled law, a claimant must demonstrate a direct, personal, and justiciable injury to have locus standi to sue. In A -G Kaduna State v. Hassan, the Supreme Court made it clear that courts are not theatres for academic exercises or political mischief. This position finds its strongest expression in Adesanya v. President of Nigeria, where the court warned against opening its doors to “meddlesome interlopers” and “professional litigants” who have no sufficient interest in the subject matter. The law, as further restated in Thomas v. Olufosoye , is that a plaintiff must show that his civil rights and obligations have been or are in danger of being infringed.
The claimant here has shown no legally cognizable injury, only political irritation dressed up as litigation. That is not locus standi; it is opportunism. As the Supreme Court held in Adesanya, “the court is not a forum for the ventilation of political grievances by busybodies.” The suit is therefore incompetent ab initio and liable to be struck out without more.
It is regrettably sad to see an Attorney General of the Federation, the Chief Law Officer of the Federation, constitutionally entrusted with fidelity to the rule of law, descend into the arena of partisan contestation, dancing naked in the market square in aid of a cause that the Constitution itself does not recognize. But the law cannot be bent to serve narrow political ends. Not even the combined weight of all Attorneys-General can transmute a defective cause into a competent one.
The present action is, in truth, nothing more than a vexatious and academic exercise. The plaintiffs are an amorphous body of meddlesome interlopers, strangers to any legally protected interest, who suffer no injury from the continued existence of the ADC or any political party. In B.B. Apugo & Sons Ltd v. O.H.M.B, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that courts do not entertain hypothetical or academic disputes divorced from real injury. Having shown none, the plaintiffs deserve no remedy.
Secondly, on the substance: even if one indulges the claim (which it does not deserve), it collapses instantly under the weight of Section 225A itself.
The Constitution provides disjunctive, not cumulative, grounds for deregistration. This is not a buffet where all conditions must be satisfied before a party survives. Compliance with any one constitutional threshold is sufficient to sustain legal existence.
The most decisive of these is electoral performance, winning at least one seat in the categories specified.
On this point, the ADC is comfortably within constitutional protection. It secured legislative seats in the 2023 general elections, including Hon. Leke Abejide (House of Representatives, Kogi State) and Hon. Cephas Dyako (Benue State House of Assembly), among others. These are recent, verifiable electoral outcomes, not distant history. To pretend otherwise is not oversight; it is willful mischief. This alone is sufficient to defeat any suggestion of deregistration.
And it gets worse for the claimant.
The presence, or even prior presence, of legislators elected on the ADC platform satisfies the constitutional threshold. The Constitution does not impose a continuing occupancy test tied to defections; it recognizes electoral success as the benchmark. Whether seats are retained or later vacated through constitutionally permissible political movement does not retroactively erase compliance already achieved.
Beyond electoral performance, the ADC also satisfies the structural threshold. The party has maintained and continues to maintain a functional national headquarters in Abuja, alongside operational structures in well over two-thirds of the states of the Federation. indeed, with active state and local government chapters across all 36 states and the FCT. On this ground alone, it remains firmly within constitutional protection.
On administrative compliance, the party continues to meet all regulatory obligations under the Constitution, the Electoral Act, and INEC’s guidelines, including financial reporting and organizational requirements. There is no factual basis for alleging any breach that could trigger deregistration under Section 225A.
Thirdly, the insinuation that failure to secure 25% of votes automatically invites deregistration is a crude distortion of the law. That provision is alternative, not mandatory where other thresholds have been met. You cannot ignore a satisfied constitutional condition and elevate an unmet one to manufacture a case. That is not interpretation, it is distortion.
Finally, the suggestion that this situation reflects a “failure of due diligence” is deeply ironic. The real failure here is legal and intellectual due diligence. Even a cursory reading of Section 225A makes it abundantly clear that the ADC is nowhere near the danger zone of deregistration.
What we are witnessing is not a serious legal challenge, but a vexatious, politically motivated fishing expedition, crafted for propaganda value rather than judicial success.
Section 225A requires compliance with any one of its thresholds. not all. On every serious reading of that provision, the ADC is not just compliant, it is unassailable.
It is sure-footed.
It is firmly rooted.
In fact and in law.
We can therefore safely posit that the suit will not survive judicial scrutiny.
It will not survive constitutional scrutiny.
And it certainly will not survive logical scrutiny.
Alex Ter Adum, Ph.D
DDG THE NARRATIVE FORCE
alexadum45@gmail.
