The chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Joash Amupitan, on Friday met with leaders of the two warring factions of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ahead of the forthcoming Federal Capital Territory (FCT) area council elections and the Osun and Ekiti state governorship elections.

Mr Amupitan, while addressing the party leaders at the commission’s headquarters in Abuja, said the meeting had become necessary, following several correspondences received by the commission from various sides requesting one thing or the other.

He said that INEC, as an independent commission with a statutory mandate to monitor political parties’ activities and conduct elections, deemed it necessary to invite the warring groups within the party to the meeting.

“The FCT election is coming up on February 24, 2026, while the Ekiti election will be coming up in June 2026, and the Osun election in July 2026.

“As a build-up to these elections, we have issued our own schedule of activities to all the political parties, and we are on course to ensure that we have a very smooth election at the Area Council of FCT and at Eki and Osun states.

“We have decided to invite all the parties, especially given the fact that we have received conflicting correspondence from the Peoples Democratic Party.

“We felt that these rubbing minds together would be a good opportunity for us to forge the way forward concerning the elections,” said the INEC chair.

Mr Amupitan said the commission was mindful of the need to maintain the sanctity of the constitution, the Electoral Act, and the guidelines.

“Actually, INEC sits on the tripod of three-legged regimes: the constitution, the Electoral Act, and the regulations that have been made.

“So we are determined to ensure that we follow the provisions of the various laws, the constitution, and the regulations that we have made,” he said.

The INEC chairman called for frank discussions to achieve the meeting’s objectives.

The meeting later went into a closed-door section.

At the ongoing meeting are the national chairman, Tanimu Turaki; members of his National Working Committee (NWC); Board of Trustees (BoT) chairman Adolphus Wabara; and a former governor of Niger, Babangida Aliyu, among others.

Also at the meeting are the factional acting national chairman, PDP National Caretaker Committee, Abdulrahaman Mohammed, and members of his own NWC, the factional national secretary, Samuel Anyanwu, Umar Bature, and others.

(NAN)