Donald Duke’s 2027 PRP Candidacy Survives Court Challenge
Former Cross River State Governor Donald Duke’s emergence as the presidential candidate of the Peoples Redemption Party, PRP, for the 2027 election has survived a legal challenge.
The Federal High Court in Abuja on Wednesday dismissed a suit filed by an aggrieved PRP presidential aspirant, Yakubu Kingsley, seeking to nullify Duke’s emergence from the party’s May 25 primary election.
Justice Mohammed Umar ruled that the case, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1234/2026, was filed outside the constitutional timeframe for pre-election matters and was therefore statute-barred.
Kingsley had filed the suit on June 10, 16 days after the results of the PRP presidential primary were made public, but argued that the 14-day filing period should have begun on June 6.
He based his argument on the date when the party’s appeal committee communicated its decision rejecting his complaint concerning the primary election.
Justice Umar rejected the argument, holding that the suit was filed outside the period prescribed for pre-election cases and that the court consequently lacked jurisdiction to entertain it.
The judge nevertheless proceeded to consider the substance of Kingsley’s claims and dismissed them after finding that the plaintiff had failed to establish his allegations with sufficient evidence.
One of the central issues raised by Kingsley concerned Duke’s membership of the PRP before the party submitted its membership register to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, on May 4.
Kingsley argued that Duke was not a registered member of the party when the register was submitted and should therefore not have been allowed to contest its presidential primary.
Justice Umar rejected the argument, holding that membership of a political party is an internal affair and that the issue was not one over which the court could exercise jurisdiction.
Kingsley also challenged Duke’s participation in the primary on the grounds that he allegedly failed to appear physically for screening at the party’s national secretariat.
The judge noted that Kingsley relied on the PRP’s guidelines to support the claim but failed to produce the guidelines before the court as evidence of the alleged breach.
Another part of the case concerned alleged over-voting in the primary results from Bauchi, Gombe and Kwara states, which Kingsley asked the court to invalidate.
Justice Umar rejected that claim, ruling that Kingsley had failed to provide the evidence required by law to establish that over-voting occurred in the affected states.
In his suit, Kingsley had asked the court to declare him the rightful PRP presidential candidate for the 2027 election and direct INEC not to recognise Duke as the party’s flagbearer.
The court declined to grant the orders sought by Kingsley after dismissing the case on both procedural grounds and the substance of the allegations presented before it.
The ruling leaves Duke’s emergence from the PRP’s May 25 presidential primary intact in relation to the challenge determined by the Federal High Court in Abuja.
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