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The All Progressives Congress (APC) has taken Osun State Governor Ademola Adeleke’s re-election to court.

The petition is now on the notice board of the Osun State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, in Osogbo. The papers went up on Monday, 7 September. Tribunal Secretary, Pefe Belemore, had said the notices would be displayed before noon.

Secretariat staff were already in the courtroom as preparations for sitting continued.

Two petitions challenge the 15 August result that returned Adeleke for another term. The APC case, marked EPT/OS/GOV/01/2026, was filed by its candidate, Asiwaju Munirudeen Bola Oyebamiji, against Adeleke, the Accord Party and the Independent National Electoral Commission.
The Peoples Democratic Party case, marked EPT/OS/GOV/02/2026, was filed by Adebayo Olugbenga Adedamola against Adeleke, INEC and Accord. Discover more Maps Legislative Branch Politics Display of the petitions is a procedural step. The parties must still be served before full hearing begins. Adeleke remains the declared winner. The detailed grounds of each petition have not been published. The tribunal has not issued a ruling.State & Local Government

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The Social Democratic Party has picked a former Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, as its candidate for the 2027 Nasarawa State governorship election.

Adamu emerged during a substitution primary held on Saturday in Lafia, the state capital, following the withdrawal of the party’s previously listed candidate, Musa Angba.

The Independent National Electoral Commission had listed Angba as the SDP’s governorship candidate for the state before his withdrawal paved the way for the substitution.

Declaring the result, the Chairman of the SDP Electoral Committee for Nasarawa State, Joseph Achille, said the primary was conducted across the state’s 13 local government areas.

Achille said 28,637 delegates participated in the exercise, adding that the votes cast at the ward level were duly collated.

“Sitting before you today to conduct this election. As you are all aware, we have a sole candidate for the office of governor, SDP, Nasarawa State,” he told the delegates.

He subsequently declared Adamu the winner after the former police chief secured the highest number of valid votes.

“Having scored the total votes peacefully and lawfully, it gives me singular privilege, by the powers conferred on me by the National Executive Committee and the National Working Committee, to declare the result that Mohammed Abubakar Adamu scored the highest lawful valid votes.

“Subsequently, he is declared, returned, and elected as the candidate and flag-bearer of the Social Democratic Party for Nasarawa State,” Achille said.

He described the exercise as free, fair and credible before inviting Adamu to deliver his acceptance speech.

The former IG thanked the party for conducting the primary and pledged to work towards improving the state if elected in 2027.

“I am delighted that the primaries have been conducted. I’m also delighted that we have been declared the winner. My family and the people of Nasarawa State are delighted that this primary has been conducted, and we have been declared winners,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Director of Media and Strategic Communications of the Adamu Campaign Organisation, Otaru Douglas, said the former police chief’s affirmation had ended what he described as speculation over the SDP ticket.

In a statement issued after the exercise, Douglas claimed the turnout and unanimous support for Adamu demonstrated the party’s unity ahead of the election.

“The people have shown uncommon resilience and commitment to changing the governance narrative of our dear state. They have rejected politics of intimidation and inducement and have chosen competence, experience, integrity and proven leadership,” he said.

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Presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, has challenged President Bola Tinubu to open up his records for public scrutiny, just as he has done, insisting that the renewed circulation of decades-old allegations against him is a distraction from the president’s own reluctance to submit to similar examination.

In a statement issued on Friday by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, the former vice president, described the resurfacing of allegations rooted in the political battles of the President Olusegun Obasanjo era as the convulsion of political opponents cornered by their own failures, unable to defend the hardship Nigerians are enduring and now desperately searching for an Atiku controversy because they cannot survive scrutiny of their own economic record.

“At some point, desperation announces itself. When those defending this government can no longer explain why food, transportation, electricity, rent, education, insecurity and healthcare are increasingly beyond the reach of ordinary families, they rummage through twenty-year-old files looking for an escape route. This is panic dressed up as accountability,” the statement read.

Atiku maintained that the allegations had already been tested through the full machinery of the state during his political disagreement with the Obasanjo administration, and none resulted in a conviction. “Let us not rewrite history. The Obasanjo administration did not protect me. At the height of our political disagreement, these matters travelled through the EFCC, an administrative panel, the National Assembly and the courts. The machinery of the state was fully deployed, and the political hostility was public. Yet no court convicted me on these allegations. That is the record.”

He questioned what new evidence had emerged to justify reviving the allegations nearly two decades later.

According to him, “A petition is not a conviction, an acknowledgement stamp is not evidence of guilt, and repetition cannot magically become a judgment of court.” Anyone with credible evidence against me should bring it out and test it before the law. I have issued that challenge before, and I repeat it today without hesitation.”

Drawing a contrast with the President, Atiku pointed to Tinubu’s intervention in an American court case seeking the release of FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration DEA records concerning him.

“While I am saying, ‘bring out your evidence,’ Tinubu actually went to an American court to intervene in a case seeking FBI and DEA records concerning him, citing privacy interests in records he argued should not be disclosed. It is like a man ordering his neighbour to empty his pockets while keeping his own firmly zipped.

A man seeking protection for his own records has no business waving petitions at somebody else. My challenge is simple: let every lawful record be opened and every allegation tested. Let Nigerians see who welcomes scrutiny and who reaches for privacy arguments when the files concern him,” he said.

He argued, however, that the exchange of allegations does little to address the everyday economic struggles of Nigerians.

Atiku also cautioned against the use of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission EFCC as a tool for political battles, stressing that the agency belongs to the country and not to any individual or party.

He said no amount of recycled allegations could substitute for governance that improves the lives of ordinary Nigerians.

According to him, the coming elections would ultimately be decided on record and performance, not on old political battles. “The old script did not stop me then, and it will not stop me now. In 2027, Nigerians will judge us by our records, the lives they are living and the future we offer them. Those afraid of that judgment may continue rummaging through the archives. We are facing the Nigerian people.”