In this report, Kabir Akintayo takes aswipe on the activities of smaller
political parties in an evolving political
climate.
The 2015 general election may have
come and gone, but its outcome still
rings a bell in the heart of Nigerians,
what with the defeat of Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP), a party which
hitherto, often boasted that it is the
largest political party in Africa.
It is almost two years since the
emergence of President Muhammadu
Buhari of All Progressive Congress,
(APC) as the president, yet PDP, which
is the major opposition party in the
country, is still yet to put its House
together ahead of 2019.
In what should have been a time to re-
strategize and restructure the party
ahead of 2019, power tussle has made
the party almost prostrate as camps led
by Sen Ahmed Markarfi and Sen Ali
Modu Sheriff, await a court judgment to
set the leadership tussle straight. Series
of reconciliation attempts failed.
The leadership crisis has held down the
party, making it difficult to focus on
2019.
Meanwhile, the ruling party is not left
out of such brouhaha as the party is
also battling for who gets what, when
and how, hence, brewing supremacy
tussle.
The APC has been battling internal
crises. The more prominent, it could be
recalled, was when the national party
leader, Bola Tinubu, called for the
resignation of its national party
chairman, John Oyegun.
He made the call due to what he
claimed were irregularities over the
Ondo guber polls (which saw the loss of
his preferred candidate, Segun Abraham)
and the way Oyegun handled the matter.
The motion was supported by the former
vice President and National leader of the
party, Alhaji Atiku Abubak ar.
Perhaps, these observations are believed
to have given breath to the rumored
mega party formation, a party believed
to welcome many aggrieved political
actors from both the ruling and
opposition parties, APC and PDP
respectively.
But while the dramatics personae in the
mega party arrangement have since
denied any links with the idea, pundits
continue to wonder what the smaller
political parties besides the two major
parties – APC and PDP- are up to.
So far, there are 40 political parties in
the country. 60 political associations
are also waiting to be accorded political
party recognition.
The number of registered political
parties rose from 30 in 2015 to 40 in
2016.
The parties are: Better Nigeria
Progressive Party (BNPP), Democratic
Alternative (DA), Masses Movement of
Nigeria (MMN), National Action Council
(NAC) and National Democratic Liberty
Party (NDLP).
Others are Nigeria Elements Progressive
Party (NEPP), National Unity Party
(NUP), Nigeria Peoples Congress (NPC),
Peoples Progressive Party (PPP) and
Peoples Redemption Party (PRP).
Before then the Independent National
Electoral Commission (INEC) had
deregistered some political parties,
following a new regulation that such
parties must occupy a certain
percentage of elective offices. Earlier
too, INEC had stopped funding political
parties.
But following a court judgement against
the regulation, INEC desisted from
deregistering parties.
Nonetheless, it would seem that the
tradition in the political party
community, is that most of them,
particularly those that do not control
elective offices, go into hibernation,
pending the next election cycle, where
they dust up their offices not to contest
for positions but to endorse candidates
of major parties.
But while others argue that such
alliances are not out of place and are
indeed common practice all over the
world, the concern has remained the
lack of ideology prevalent in political
parties in Nigeria.
After the 2015 general election, the
major impact made by political parties
was the tussle for the chairmanship of
the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC).
On providing sustained and critical
alternative to the policies of the ruling
party, these parties have been largely
lacking, analysts opine.
A clear challenge for these parties has
been finance, particularly in a climate
where politics is so cost effective.
However, other pundits believe that
small political parties should rather
project counter ideas and seek offices at
grassroots levels based on well thought
out and tested ideology rather than
focus on seeking national elective
offices.
Still, political parties besides PDP and
APC, have shown preparedness ahead of
the 2019 general election. The National
Conscience Party, (NCP), participated
at the 2015 general election, with
Matins Onovo as the presi dential
candidate.
This time around, the party national
chairman, Alhaji Tanko Yunusa, who
expressed readiness of his party to be
very visible ahead of 2019, has said
there will be room for alliance in order
to enhance the chance of becoming
victorious.
“To us in the National Conscience Party,
NCP, this is a time for sober reflection
and rededication to the struggle for the
real political change in the interests of
the masses that would lead to the
abolition of poverty.
“To the Nigerian masses and youth, it is
clear that they have to rise up and take
their destinies in their own hands.
“2017 is a year we urge everybody to
get politically organized. Change would
never drop from the sky. The first step of
the liberation of the Nigerian masses is
for everybody to get politically
conscious and organized. Joining the
National Conscience Party is a step in
this direction. The NCP remains the only
party of the Nigerian masses standing
and the party has been behind all the
struggles of the masses since it was
founded in resistance to military
dictatorship in 1994”.
The All progressive grand alliance
(APGA), has also vowed to contest at
the federal level, come 2019. This is
coming after the nomination of its
acting chairman, Ozo Nwabueze Okafor
who made the revelation that the era of
adopting another partycandidates at the
Federal level is over. It could be recall
that for both 2011 and 2015
presidential election, the party adopted
the formal president, Good luck Ebele
Jonathan as its presidential candidate.
The party chairman also debunked the
rumour of APGA forming alliance with
other political parties.
“The APGA’s message is on building the
best economy and we have the potential
of being the biggest political party. We
will ensure that APGA spreads to all
parts of this country. As a former
national chairman of Association of
Local Governments in Nigeria, ALGON,
we will leverage on that to ensure that
the contacts we have in all the 774
local government areas of the country
are exploited. We are equally embarking
on membership drive to move from the
centre to the periphery” he said.
Reacting to talks of such realignments,
national chairman of the PDM, Bashir
Yusuf Ibrahim said “every political party
goes through a process of realignment
and renewal after every general election.
“The PDM is not different. We are
speaking to major stakeholders in
Nigeria’s politics and they are speaking
to us. The general consensus is that
there is a dire need to find a third
option to moving our nation forward
and PDM is at a the centre of these
discussions. It is too early in the day to
tell what the end result of these
discussions will be.”
National secretary of the Social
Democratic Party (SDP) Dr Sadiq Gombe,
said that the SDP which was formerly
the SDMP was a champion of merger in
Nigeria.
He recalled “prior to the 2011 election,
we were the once who initially
summoned the CPC of Buhari, the ACN
of Tinubu and Atiku, the ANPP and
APGA, to a meeting, to say enough of
PDP misrule. That we needed to come
together to salvage the situation.
Unfortunately when the the merge
eventually took place they did not invite
us because they felt we did not have
any major elected public office holder.
“They don’t believe in smaller parties in
this country and the only time you are a
smaller party is when you don’t win any
election.”
He further added “there are talks here
and there that some people want to
come in. But if people want to come into
your house, you want to look inward
and see what is in the house. That is
how organize are you? How transparent
are you running your affairs?”
However, political associations
posturing to become political parties
are also getting set to join the fray. On
of such is Nigeria patriots.
The association, in a recent press
briefing, called on important political
figures to join them which he regarded
as the mega party.
The head of the steering committee of
the party, Chief Dosu Oladipo who made
the call also added that a number of
chieftains of APC, PDP, Labour party,
(LP) and APGA are also part of the
proposed party.
Meanwhile, the youths are also
clamouring for more space to
participate in the political settings. This
has led to formation of Young
Progressive Congress, (YPC) Young
Confederation Party, (YCP) and National
Youth Movement, (NYM).
LEADERSHIP Weekend gathered that all
these youth-based associations are to
form alliance ahead of 2019.
Acting national chairman of YPC,
Comrade Olajide Wolimoh, said that the
youths are working together with the
Senate in ensuring the passage of the
bill “ not too young to run” as he said,
it will enable more youth participation
in politics and also influence the sense
of belonging at the federal level.
“Here we have the real Nigerian youths
with new orientation. When people say
even the youths are corrupt, I query
their sense of judgement because they
are only operating on the corrupt
system laid down. They said if you can’t
beat them you join them, this time
around, we don’t want to join them, we
want to leave them, open a new path,
new system that will be driven by equity
and justice. This new system will thrive
on innovation.
In addition, some youth activist
expressed their grievances, saying that,
the time of old ones using the youth to
achieve their political ambition is over.
One of the activists, Lukman Salahude
en
who spoke to LEADERSHIP Weekend
said,“There will be a political
revolutionary party which will unseat all
old hands in power and replace them
with young active patriotic and
innovative citizens. The obvious failures
of successive governments has proven
that Nigerian problem is beyond party.
We have to understand that Nigeria
needs revolution to stabilize her
fortunes, we are embarking on
intellectual, political revolution which
aims is to remove all old greedy and
failed leaders from power corridors” he
said.
However, the APC, is making frantic
moves to reconcile all grudges within
the party, and striving to satisfy the
divergent interest of its leaders.
Likewise, the main opposition party,
PDP, battling with its reconciliation
process, awaits the court ruling to help
them move at a faster pace.
So far so good, the only major threat to
the ruling party, APC, analysts opine,
remains the rumoured Mega Party,
whether it would materialize remains a
matter of conjecture.
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