By Adesina Wahab
A group, the Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC) has described the omission of the name of Prof. Ibrahim Isa Ali Pantami as the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Gombe after a court-ordered fresh primary as an act of impunity and contempt of court.
The group therefore called for the immediate reinstatement of Pantami’s name, describing its omission on the list of gubernatorial candidates by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as illegal and unjust.
Addressing a press conference at its headquarters in Lagos on Tuesday, MURIC Founder/Executive Director, Prof. Ishaq Akintola, said the development was clearly unjust.
MURIC recalled that Pantami was the sole governorship aspirant of the PDP in Gombe as at May 2026 and was affirmed by voice vote on May 26, 2026, at an event presided over by the PDP electoral committee chairman for the state, Gregory Yenlong.
According to the group, the initial primary was nullified by a Federal High Court which ordered a fresh primary. The fresh primary was held on September 29, 2026, where Pantami scored 2,054 votes to defeat Khamisu Mailantarki and Aliyu Garry, who polled 389 and 112 votes respectively.
The group claimed that INEC monitored the fresh primary, with a team led by Mr. Gambo Umar Arabi, who signed and submitted an official report.
“While President Bola Tinubu is working very hard on economic reforms, Amupitan is pursuing his hidden agenda in INEC, namely, to weed out Islamic scholars among the candidates in the 2027 general elections, particularly those vying for higher offices like the governorship post.
”Incidentally, Professor Ibrahim Isa Ali Pantami is vying for the position of the governor of Gombe State under the banner of the PDP and Amupitan has special interest in him. He must explain this special interest.
“We said it a long time ago. A man who took it upon himself to write an 80-page legal brief replete with falsehoods against Nigerian Muslims on the basis of which the United States labelled Nigeria as a country of special concern, a Christian-killer nation and a country where Christian genocide reigns supreme cannot be a good electoral umpire.
”If Amupitan can manufacture all those lies against Nigerian Muslims in his 80-page legal brief which he willingly sent to the United States, nothing stops him from concocting allegations against the only Islamic scholar contesting for the post of governor in today’s Nigeria, something unheard of before in this country.
“On what ground is INEC disowning a process it was part of? The presence of INEC at the PDP primary which produced Pantami proves beyond any reasonable doubt that both Pantami and his party went through due process,” he stated.
The Islamic human rights group accused INEC Chairman, Professor Joash Amupitan, of being responsible for the omission, alleging religious bias.
The group cited examples of Christian clerics serving as governors, including Pastor Umo Eno of Akwa Ibom, Apostle Bassey Otu of Cross River, Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Alia of Benue, and Pastor Agbu Kefas of Taraba, and questioned why an Islamic scholar could not be allowed to contest in Gombe.
“We put it to INEC that its chairman has a ‘Candidate of Special Concern’ and it is no other than Professor Isa Ali Pantami,” Akintola said.
MURIC said it had earlier protested the appointment of Professor Amupitan as INEC chairman, along with the Supreme Council for Shariah in Nigeria (SCSN), and that the handling of Pantami’s candidature had vindicated its position.
The group passed a vote of no confidence in the INEC chairman and called on President Tinubu to appoint a detribalised and religiously neutral replacement.
“MURIC demands the immediate reinstatement of the name of Professor Ibrahim Isa Ali Pantami as the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party in Gombe State,” the statement concluded.
MURIC stressed that it is a non-partisan Islamic human rights organisation whose interest is in the protection of the fundamental rights of Nigerian Muslims across all political parties.
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