Atiku's sworn INEC form dates his master's degree to 2020 and his school certificate to 1961. The certificate filed with it says 2021, his own life story 1965

On Saturday, 1 August 2026, the Independent National Electoral Commission published the Form EC9 particulars of the candidates for the January 2027 presidential election. Section 29(3) of the Electoral Act 2026 requires this so that the public can check them. Politics Nigeria published photographs that day of four pages from the filing of Atiku Abubakar, the African Democratic Congress candidate. Each page carries an INEC stamp reading "PRES AND NASS ELECTIONS 2027 RECEIVED" with a handwritten July 2026 date. Part C of the form asks for educational qualifications, with the instruction "Attach evidence of all educational qualifications". It has three lines: PRIMARY, F.S.L.C., 1954; SECONDARY, WASC, 1961; HIGHER, MA. (INT. RELATIONS), 2020.

Another of the four pages is a copy of the certificate for that master's degree. It reads: "ABUBAKAR ATIKU has been awarded the degree of MASTER OF ARTS having successfully completed an approved programme in INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS". The date printed under it is "November 2021", and the signature is that of Professor Roderick Watkins, Vice Chancellor of Anglia Ruskin University. The records made at the time agree with the certificate, not with the form. On 14 November 2021 TheCable reported that Akinwumi Adesina, president of the African Development Bank, had congratulated Atiku on X the day before "on passing 2 days ago his Masters in International Relations degree program at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, UK". So the sworn form says 2020, and the certificate filed with it says November 2021.

The secondary school date also conflicts with Atiku's own account. In 2014 his campaign website, atiku.org, carried a first-person page headed "My Life". The Internet Archive captured it on 28 September 2014, and Vero Record read that capture. "In 1960, I was admitted to Adamawa Provincial Secondary School in Yola," it says. It goes on: "In 1961, when I was 15 years old, my mother's elder brother sold the family house in Jada without her knowledge and rendered us homeless. I spent that holiday working." Under the heading "Post Secondary School" the page says: "I graduated from secondary school in 1965." On his own telling, then, 1961 was his second year at secondary school, not the year of his West African School Certificate. The domain atiku.org now loads an unrelated gambling page, which is why we relied on the archived copy.

The same 2014 page also held a longer version of his story in its source code, inside a block that did not display on screen. That version is more specific on both points: "In 1954, when I was 8 years old, my uncle enrolled me in the Jada Primary School", and "I graduated from secondary school with a Grade Three WASC/GCE Certificate in 1965." We label this carefully. It was published on his domain but hidden from view, and we do not know who wrote it or why it was hidden. Read at face value, 1954 is the year he began primary school, not the year he left it with a First School Leaving Certificate. Our own arithmetic, graded C, gives the same result. The form states his date of birth as 25 November 1946, so he was seven for most of 1954 and turned eight in its last weeks.

Atiku's 2022 filing, made when he was the Peoples Democratic Party candidate for 2023, gave a different secondary year. Legit.ng reported that the 1965 West African School Certificate he submitted then bore the name "Siddiq Abubakar", and that he gave no information about his primary education. Sahara Reporters (2 July 2022) reported that he submitted an affidavit telling INEC he had changed his name from Siddiq Abubakar, the name on his West African School Certificate. Vero Record has not seen the 2022 documents, so all of this is graded B. If the reports are accurate, Atiku has now given INEC two different years, 1965 and 1961, for the same certificate in two consecutive election cycles.

That 2022 affidavit bears on a second line of the 2026 form. Item 3 of Part B asks for "Former name(s)", and on Atiku's page, as photographed, the space is blank. The four published pages do not show whether his 2026 filing again included the WASC or the name affidavit. Politics Nigeria's photographs show the particulars page, the education and work page, the sworn declaration and the Anglia Ruskin certificate. We cannot say what else is in the file INEC holds.

The page also lists work history. Nigerian Customs Service, 1969 to 1989, left by "VOLUNTRY RETIREMENT" (spelt that way on the form), and Presidential Villa, Abuja, 1999 to 2007, "2 TERMS ELAPSED". Both agree with his published biography. The 2014 page says his customs career began on 30 June 1969 and that he retired voluntarily in April 1989. The same page names two earlier qualifications that the 2026 form does not list: a diploma from the School of Hygiene, Kano, in 1967, and a law diploma from the Ahmadu Bello University Institute of Administration, ending in 1969. The form does not require every qualification, and leaving these out is not a discrepancy. It does mean the form and his own biography give different accounts of his education after secondary school.

The form is sworn. Part E, headed "Declaration before a Commissioner for Oaths in the High Court", reads: "I hereby declare that all the answers, facts and particulars I have given in this form are true and correct, and I have, to the best of my knowledge, fulfilled all the requirements for qualification for the office I am seeking to be elected." It is signed above the word DEPONENT. It is marked as sworn at the High Court of Justice in June 2026 and stamped by a commissioner for oaths of the FCT High Court, Abuja. The handwritten day is hard to read in the published photograph: one date beside the court seal appears to be 24 June and another beside the signature 29 June. Section 29(2) of the Electoral Act 2026 requires each candidate's information to come with an affidavit sworn at a Federal or State High Court or the FCT High Court.

INEC's own record repeats the qualifications but gives no dates. Vero Record downloaded the commission's signed "Final List of Candidates" for the 2027 presidential election from inecnigeria.org. At entry 5 it shows ADC, "ABUBAKAR ATIKU", PWD "None", age 79, gender M, qualifications "F.S.L.C. WASC MA. (INT. RELATIONS". Each page is signed by Rose Oriaran-Anthony, Secretary of the Commission. Because the list has no years, the dates exist only in the EC9 and its attachments.

The press reports we read after INEC published the forms repeated the 2020 date without comparing it with the attached certificate. Politics Nigeria, ThisDay, Legit.ng, Megastar Magazine and Nigerian Eye all wrote that Atiku obtained his FSLC in 1954, his WASC in 1961 and his master's in 2020. ThisDay added that the master's came from Anglia Ruskin University "in 2020". We did not find any public statement from Atiku or the ADC about the dates.

This matters more because of a case Atiku himself brought. As Vero Record reported on 26 September, he is the first plaintiff in suit FHC/ABJ/CS/1888/2026 at the Federal High Court in Abuja. He swore a 25-paragraph affidavit asking the court to find President Tinubu ineligible, on the basis of documents Tinubu filed with INEC. We apply the same test to every candidate: read what they swore and set it beside their own records. Tinubu's entry on the same INEC list shows only "B.Sc", with no primary or secondary certificate. Atiku's entry shows all three levels, but the years he swore to do not agree with his own documents.

The legal effect is narrower than the political one. Section 131(d) of the Constitution requires a presidential candidate to have been "educated up to at least School Certificate level or its equivalent". Section 137(1)(j) disqualifies anyone who "has presented a forged certificate" to INEC. Under Section 29(5) of the Electoral Act 2026, only an aspirant who took part in the same party's primaries may sue a candidate for a declaration that information in the affidavit is false. Under Section 29(6), the court may disqualify only where the false information "relates to constitutional requirements of eligibility". Section 285(9) of the Constitution requires every pre-election matter to be filed within 14 days of the event complained of. Our reading, graded C, is that the master's degree date has no bearing on constitutional eligibility, and a wrong year on a real school certificate is not the same thing as a false qualification.

The documents do not establish several things, and we say so plainly. They do not show that Atiku lacks a West African School Certificate or any other qualification. They do not suggest that any certificate is forged. They do not show that the wrong dates were entered deliberately, or by Atiku rather than an aide filling in the form. There are innocent explanations. Two of the three dates, 1954 and 1961, match events his own biography places in those years: starting primary school and a holiday during secondary school. They may be entry dates, or years copied in the wrong column. For the master's degree, 2020 may be when he finished his coursework rather than when the degree was awarded. None of the documents we read supports or rules out that explanation.

What the documents do establish is that the candidate declared on oath that the particulars on the form were "true and correct", including three education dates, and that his own certificate and his own earlier published account contradict each one. This concerns a candidate who is asking a court to rule on the accuracy of a rival's filings with the same commission. It is a question his campaign can answer with one document: the Anglia Ruskin award record, and the original of the certificate whose date differs from the form by a year.

Two further records would settle most of this. Under Section 29(4) of the Electoral Act 2026, anyone may obtain from INEC a certified true copy of a candidate's nomination form, affidavit and attached documents on payment of a prescribed fee, within 14 days. Vero Record does not buy records, so we have not requested one. Our reporting rests on Politics Nigeria's photographs of four pages, not on the file itself. A certified copy would show whether the 2026 filing includes the 1965 certificate and the name affidavit reported in 2022.

Vero Record did not put these questions to Atiku's campaign or the ADC before publication. We will publish any response in full, and we will correct this report if a certified copy of the filing shows different dates from the ones in the published photographs.

What this rests on

Photographs of four pages of Atiku's 2026 Form EC9 filing, INEC-stamped and published by Politics Nigeria on 1 August 2026 (particulars page, education and work page, sworn declaration, Anglia Ruskin certificate dated November 2021), which we examined image by image. INEC's signed Final List of Candidates, downloaded and read (A). The Electoral Act 2026 (s.29) from inecnigeria.org, read (A). The Constitution (ss.131, 137, 285(9)), read (A). The Internet Archive capture of atiku.org "My Life" from 28 September 2014, read including its source (A for what the page said). TheCable (2021) and Sahara Reporters and Legit.ng (2022) press reports (B). Vero Record's own date arithmetic (C).

What this does not establish

Whether the dates were entered deliberately or by mistake, or by Atiku or an aide. Whether 2020 is a coursework completion year. Whether the 2026 file includes the 1965 WASC or the Siddiq Abubakar name affidavit. The exact day the affidavit was sworn and the exact INEC receipt date, since the handwriting is unclear in the photographs. The contents of the 2022 filing, which we know only from press reports. No certified true copy was obtained, and the photographs were not compared against the originals at INEC. Nothing here indicates any certificate is forged or that Atiku lacks the constitutional minimum qualification. No response from Atiku or the ADC has been sought or received.