March 27, (THEWILL) – There were 92 political parties in Nigeria before the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) deregistered many of them in February 2020, leaving 18. INEC had acted in line with Section 257 of the Constitution (as amended), which empowers it to deregister 74 parties for their lacklustre performance in the 2019 general election.
The two major political parties, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the (Peoples Democratic Party) are among the surviving 18 parties that were finally registered by the electoral umpire.
Others are the Action Alliance (AA); African Action Congress (AAC); African Democratic Congress (ADC); Action Democratic Party (ADP); All Progressives Congress (APC); All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA); Allied People’s Movement (APM); Action People’s Party (APP); Boot Party (BP): Labour Party (LP); New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP); National Rescue Movement (NRM); Peoples Democratic Party (PDP); Peoples Redemption Party (PRP); Social Democratic Party (SDP); Young Progressive Party (YPP); and Zenith Labour Party (ZLP).
INEC has said that it will not be able to field new parties in the 2023 general election. This means that only the 18 political parties will be on the ballot, come 2023 when another general election will be held.
The Resident Electoral Commissioner for Rivers State, Obo Effanga, clarified that only the 18 registered political parties would take part in the forthcoming 2023 general election
Effanga explained that even if more political parties were registered, they would not be able to field candidates in the general election, since the new Electoral Act prescribes that political parties must be registered one year before the election.
Political analysts believe that of all the 18 registered political parties, only the APC and the PDP did well in elections held over the past years.
Also watchers of political developments in the country have concluded that most of the remaining 16 parties do not only perform poorly during elections, but they are also dumb and numb as preparation for the 2023 general election gathers momentum. This situation has compelled many Nigerians to assume that although the country lays claim to a multi-party political system, what is actually on ground is a two-party system.
Comrade Gbenga Ojo, a public affairs commentator based in Abuja, told THEWILL that only two of the 18 registered political parties (the APC and PDP) had performed well in past elections held in the country. He added that even as the country moves towards 2023, the PDP and APC are the only ones visibly preparing for the forthcoming election.
He described the situation as unacceptable, saying, “It is either these other parties brace up or they should be deregistered.”
Ojo commended INEC for pruning the political parties from 92 to 18 in 2020. He urged the Commission to monitor the performance of the parties in the 2023 general election and afterwards prune the list of registered parties once again.
But the National Chairman of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Chief Ralph Nwosu, disagreed with the notion that only two parties had been active in terms of preparation for the 2023 general election.
He said the ADC on its part had commenced talks with some political groups under the aegis of the Coalition for New Nigeria (CNN) on areas of collaboration in the 2023 general election.
Nwosu said the party believed that there was a need for all hands to be on deck to give the country a better deal.
He noted that despite the challenges in the country, the vision for a better Nigeria must be kept alive. He added that the meeting between his party and CNN was intended to create a synergy that would create a positive change in the polity in 2023.
“We have our challenges. But we must not allow these challenges to blur our vision for our country. In 2016, we set up CNN as the first major coalition of political parties so that we can find a way to move our country forward.
‘The system has to change and it has to change democratically. They are meeting to create that compass that will lead us to a successful 2023. And they are committed,” Nwosu said.
On his part, the Acting National Chairman of CNN, Chief Peter Ameh, said the meeting with the ADC leadership WAS aimed at repositioning the country.
“We have started this discussion to continue to work out the modalities for which we will birth for Nigeria, a new and progressive nation. That we will be able to come up with candidates that will represent the true wishes and aspirations of our people; candidates that will arise from free and fair primaries conducted within the party.
“As our members have deliberated, they have agreed there will be a major retreat where we will announce our final decision,” Ameh stated.
Nwosu said the party had also unveiled the party’s presidential aspirant, 42-year-old Chukwuka Monye, in Asaba, capital of Delta State.
He said that a new Nigeria would begin with ADC in 2023, adding, “APC and PDP have failed Nigerians and reduced Nigeria to the poverty capital of the world with ravaging insecurity and dilapidated infrastructure in the past 22 years they held on to power at the centre.
“ADC has been built over the last 20 years to become the party of the moment and the much desired third force to upstage the APC and PDP.
“A new Nigeria will begin with ADC. APC and PDP are the same. You can’t differentiate between the two parties. They are the same people”
Nwosu vowed that ADC would displace the governing APC and the main opposition party, PDP, in the 2023 presidential election.
Also speaking on the general election, the ADC presidential aspirant, Chukwuka Monye, said he decided to pitch his political tent with the ADC because of its ideology of restoring the dignity and value of Nigerians.
While speaking on the issue, a former National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Senator Victor Umeh, agreed that the season of politics had commenced, but he noted that not all the political parties would roll out their programmes for the 2023 general election at the same time.
“You are wrong to say that only the APC and PDP are preparing for the 2023 general election. On our part, we are preparing. APGA is not quiet. We are keying into current events and also all the political parties are yet to run out their programmes to participate in the next election. When the time comes, APGA will run out its own programme.
“As for the 2023 general election, I assure you that APGA will fight for all positions available across the country.”
Asked if he was worried that the APGA, which is the third biggest party in the country, had not unveiled any presidential aspirant, Umeh said he was not worried.
“May be you are not aware that we have a presidential aspirant in the person of former Anambra Chief Judge, Prof Peter Nnamdi. He has declared his interest. Other people are still consulting. We are watching events in other political parties. In every election, we will put our candidates’ names forward. We still have time. But I can assure you that we are not sleeping,” he said.
Another issue that bothers political pundits is that even the two dominant parties, PDP and APC, are actually not different ideologically, but only in personality.
They believe that is why defectors can swing from one party to the other with ease.
Pundits also believe that the high presence of bigwigs that are crowd pullers, big spenders and grassroots mobilisers make the big parties to outshine the smaller ones in any contest.
The General Secretary of the Conference of Nigerian Political Parties, Chief Willy Ezugwu, also talked about the dominance of the two political parties in elections.
In an interview with THEWILL in an interview, Ezugwu said, “How would you explain that only two parties, the APC and the PDP, are functional in the country? There is bad governance and hunger in the land. Before now, political parties used to generate their own funds. Not anymore. We were as many as 97 at a time, but after INEC deregistered parties we became less than 20. Many of them are finding it hard to cope.
“But are the two strong parties providing the leadership and opposition required of them? Due to the continued indulgence in anti-democratic tendencies, internal democracy in Nigeria’s political parties has continued to nose-dive in the last 22 years of our democratic experiments.
“The two self-acclaimed biggest political parties in Nigeria, the APC and the PDP, have continued to hang on to practices that negate the core tenets of democracy globally, leading to stagnated growth of Nigeria’s democracy and the sustenance of bad governance at all levels of government.
“As a result of lack of interest in the cornerstones of democracy, such as freedom of speech and rights to hold divergent opinion, inclusiveness and equality, citizenship, consent of the governed in decision making and trampling upon their rights to choose their leaders, among others, Nigerians have continued to wallow in penury in the midst of plenty.
“This is why the two parties have continued to manipulate the country’s political space, exchanging members and elected officials, who defect at will, and maintaining a high level of disregard to their own party’s constitution, such that the courts have become the last resort for most aggrieved members who can afford the cost of litigation.
“The internal conflict resolution mechanisms in both political parties are either hijacked by competing godfathers or comatose, merely existing in their party constitutions.
“As impunity has continued to thrive in the two political parties, the consequence is the unending emergence of factions and cliques of aggrieved members at the end of every internal election, including congresses and primary elections.
“Nigeria’s democracy cannot advance beyond where we are as the country will continue to recycle corrupt politicians and their cronies that end up impoverishing the populace. This will remain our experience if the bar of internal democracy and adherence to the cornerstones of democracy is not raised and given priority by the two dominant parties.
“We therefore challenge the APC and the PDP, as leading political parties, to live by example of the standards of democratic parties as we approach the 2023 general elections. This will not only deepen democracy in the country, but also ensure that the people’s rights to choose their leaders within the parties and at general elections are upheld without manipulations, rigging or impositions”
The presidential candidate of the YPP in the 2019 election, who recently joined the African Democratic Congress ahead of the 2023 polls, Prof Kingsley Moghalu supports Ezugwu’s views.
He said, “The political status quo and its two major parties have failed Nigerians. To vote for them again is to waste your vote. The results, for the past 22 years, include rigged elections, Nigeria as the poverty capital of the world, 4,000 megawatts of electricity for 200 million people, 33 per cent unemployment, terrorism, and our lives today cheaper than the naira to the dollar. We must now focus on governance beyond politics if we are ever to escape from today’s mess and the misery it will surely continue to generate if the same recycled politicians remain in charge.”
About the Author
AYO ESAN, has been actively reporting and analyzing political events for different newspapers for over 18 years. He has also successfully covered national and state elections in Nigeria since the inception of this democracy in 1999.
