2 weeks ago
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On Monday, 27th January 2025, five organisations, namely: African Centre for Leadership (Center LSD); Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD); Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD); Peering Advocacy and Advancement Centre in Africa (PAACA); and National Peace Committee (NPC) summoned a national conference on strengthening democracy in Nigeria.
The timing of this conference is propitious. Its choice of keynote speaker is ennobling. The organisers demonstrated savvy and astuteness in appointing Muhamudu Bawumia, the immediate past vice president of Ghana to the role. By so doing, they honoured him for strengthening democracy in his country, and by extrapolation, the West African sub region. Bawumia had conceded defeat in advance of the declaration of the result of the presidential election of last December, which he contested, by the Ghana Electoral Commission.
The timing of the conference is also apt. It came at a time when the country is bracing itself for yet another general election in 2027. It coincided with a time when stakeholders are calling for more reforms of the electoral process following the challenges spawn by the conduct of the 2023 general elections. It came at a time when voter turnout is at its most dismal since 1999. More importantly, it coincided with a moment of great national despair, occasioned by the incredible failure of the political class to impact positively on the lives of Nigerians. Against this backdrop, and the sorry state in which we have found ourselves, such a conference was a God-send and an auspicious opportunity for stakeholders to ventilate themselves and for members of the opposition to upbraid the government and to make their case to the Nigerian people.
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The untiring former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, who has been a thorn on the sides of the President Ahmed Bola Tinubu administration, fired the first salvo. He alleged, among other things, that the government was bribing the leaderships of the opposition political parties with fifty million Naira each in order to weaken them.
Subscribing to this sentiment, Malam Nasir El-Rufa’i, a former Governor of Kaduna State, volunteered that: “The way and manner opposition political parties are being targeted for destruction and the style and quality of governance in this country today is a national emergency. It should concern everyone…we stand the risk of losing democracy itself”. As if this remark was not damning enough, El-Rufa’i, who is a founding member of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC), stated that: ”I no longer recognise the APC. No party organ of the APC has met for the past two years. No caucus, no NEC meeting. You don’t even know if it is a one-man show; it is a zero-man show”.
El-Rufa’i then delivered the final blow by canvassing for a merger of opposition political parties in the manner of the coalition that led to the formation of the APC in 2014.
Peter Obi, the Labour Party’s presidential candidate in the 2023 general elections, who had earlier distanced himself from the prospect of such a coalition because it tended to promote power grab, made an about turn. He clarified that: ”I have not, and will never advocate for any coalition or alliance that does not prioritise the welfare and progress of the ordinary Nigerian”.These fireworks, and similar ones, generated by the opposition at the conference received a staunch and immediate pushback from the governing APC and spokespersons, official and unofficial, of the president. By the same token, a number of opposition political parties vehemently denied former Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s allegation of bribery.
One of President Tinubu’s defenders, Reno Omokri, accused El-Rufa’i of “coup-baiting”. He wrote: ”Not only is it irresponsible for any politicians to bait the military to take over…but it is also treasonous, especially when such comments are being made by a man who was himself a danger to democracy while he held sway”.
President Tinubu’s Special Adviser on Policy Communication, Daniel Bwala, expressed similar sentiments. He said: “History is replete with examples. It is a government you participated in its formation that you now want to unseat”.
The former vice president shortchanged himself by making a serious allegation without proof. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the Labour Party (LP) continue to undermine themselves by the leadership dysfunctions which they exhibit. This dysfunction was climaxed on Wednesday, 29th January, 2025. A meeting of the PDP’s Board of Trustees (BOT) was marred by a fight by followers of two rival candidates for the position of National Secretary of the party.Also, El-Rufa’i acutely lacks the moral credentials to pontificate on uplifting democratic values. His eight-year tenure as Governor of Kaduna was bereft of due process, compassion and fellow-feeling. Divisive to a fault, he drove a section of his own state to the margins.
These shortcomings should, however, not obscure the difficulties that hobble our democracy. As it is, our political process is challenged by serious voter apathy and deep mistrust of the Election Management Body (EMB). Political parties do not observe due process or internal democracy in the manner their candidates emerge. Emphasis is placed on money rather capability and merit in the choice or emergence of candidates. Little store is set by ideology. The supremacy of the party and its ideals are cavalierly discountenanced. This explains the serial defections which politicians execute. They do so without qualms, cogent explanations or elan. This propensity to disregard or jettison articles of faith willingly subscribed to, and at whim, explains, partially, the tragedy of the APC, and by extension, Nigeria. In 2014, the APC claimed it was out to revamp the economy and to fight corruption. It has failed resoundingly.
Continued on www.dailytrust.com
Nick Dazang is a former director at the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)
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