A major outcry by the opposition in the country is that they lost elections due to failure of the authorities to play by the rules. Yet it is apparent that the opposition parties, Peoples Democratic Party; Social Democratic Party; Labour Party, pay lip service to putting their houses in order before election time. With 2027 still a not too long distance away, KUNLE ODEREMI examines the situations in Nigeria’s leading opposition parties if at all they are planning or working towards the next general election.
There have been speculations twice this year that main opposition parties that trailed the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 2023 general election had begun exploratory talks on forging a broad based platform ahead 2027 elections. The parties are basically the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the Labour Party (LP) and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP). Incidentally, their principal actors: Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Mr Peter Obi and Dr Musa Kwankwaso co-habited under the PDP umbrella before the battle for the ticket of the party for the 2023 presidential contest threw spanner into the works. So, each of them became the standard-bearer of their parties in the election.
The first speculation that they may have set aside their political difference was sparked by exchange of visits by the political gladiators. The speculation became dignified by some of their close allies and party top notch members, who told the media that there was indeed ongoing consultations among them to team with the aim of presenting a united and formidable force against the ruling APC in subsequent elections. The frenzy within the camp of the opposition parties soon ebbed not necessarily because of the reservations that followed the initiative among some party big wigs and critics and the APC but due to the obvious lack of pragmatic steps by the camps of the former presidential candidate. Chieftains of the NNPP and the Labour Party in particular had declared that their parties were not ready to compromise on the issues of identity and their principal playing a fiddle role in any of form of political marriage.
A fresh round of speculation surfaced a couple of weeks back that the political leaders are considering cooperation and collaboration to forge a common front. It was speculated that the leaders used the occasion of public gathering hosted by one of them to hold a closed-door discussion on the possibility of coming up with a unified platform that could halt the victory of the APC in general elections. Yet, nothing concrete appears to have been achieved in the plot to build a close-knit movement as everything so far is akin to the metaphorical barber’s chair.
The main obstacle in the opposition against a common front is the ownership mentality of the major actors. Most analysts and observers claim that none among the main gladiators is willing and prepared to concede to the other on who should lead because of the entrepreneurial mentality. Rather than allowing the tenets of democracy to dictate, the urge to have total control of party structures tends to take pre-eminence and precedent over other considerations. For instance, a presidential candidate believes he must determine the national chairman of the party. He sees himself as the de facto kingmaker, god father and the constituted authority. Some leaders of the opposition also see the crisis as often the hands of Esau and the voice of Jacob, but the undue influence of external forces of destabilization could have been minimal if the parties are able to put their house in order, block all crevices that could be explored and exploited by the Fifth Columnists.
Other observers listed inordinate ambition as another critical issue that impedes the efforts of the opposition to come together to achieve the aim of creating an upset at the poll in recent elections in the country. This is why the conscious attempt to control the structure and mechanism of the parties is most pronounced and the source of frictions and bitterness in the political circle. With their huge financial muscle, those demagogues tend to be more domineering and assertive in the affairs of the party and the likelihood of having such control and authority in coalition might become rare. So, there is always a serious area of conflict.
Perhaps, the most intriguing factor in the bid by the opposition to team up is the protracted internal crisis and unbridled power game ravaging the individual parties. Many of those conflicts arise from ideological incompatibility of the key players. What brings them together is the urge to acquire power and not for altruistic aim and objectives. Therefore, the tendency by those individuals to fight in the bid to become the sole powerbrokers and ride roughshod on other well-meaning members subsists.
At another time, the leadership of the African democratic Congress (ADC) had indicated that a preponderance of the other parties planned to forge a coalition. He listed a chain of events and programmes already lined up towards actualising the ultimate goal of creating a broad-based platform to prosecute the next general election in the country. Part of the events was a summit being put together by the ADC to be held in Kaduna, the political headquarters of the North. So far, the public is still expectant on the ADC plan to midwife the coalition that will form a winning machine at elections. In 2019, the party had served as a fulcrum in the quest by some forces led by former President Olusegun Obasanjo to form a Third Force capable of displacing the APC and the PDP from power at the federal level. The initiative came about five years after some bigwigs, including governors, members of the National Assembly of the PDP joined forces with a faction of the APGA, the Action Congress of Nigeria and the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) formed by former Head of State, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd) to form the APC and successfully humbled the PDP at the general election.
Of all the main opposition parties, the PDP has suffered more incalculable damage to internal conflicts. The power brokers approach crisis as a fight to the finish, deploying all arsenals to pursue self-serving agenda. Having lost in the incendiary battle and weakened its structure, some of the combatants usually dump the PDP to seek refuge in other parties. According to some pundits, the PDP has reaped in excess the repercussions of the foundation it laid during the process that led to the 2003 general election. The PDP was believed to have encouraged the internal crisis that dealt devastating blow to the then vibrant Alliance for Democracy (AD) that controlled the South-West from 1999. Some prominent politicians in the party migrated to the PDP to boost the chances of the then President Olusegun Obasanjo in his second term bid. About a decade after, the PDP was at the receiving end of the gale of defection as a considerable number of its stalwarts with evident electoral value team with other parties to form the APC that won the 2015 general election. The majority of the leaders in the other leading parties are formerly of the PDP. Beginning from the 2014 mass exodus of its leaders to the rival parties, the centre cannot hold in the PDP as a few power brokers have held the party by the jugular. The activation of the conflict resolution mechanism of the PDP has only achieved partial healing of the wounds being created almost at every election circle and season. Recommendations of a series of reconciliation committees set by the party at different times in the past are implemented subject to the whims and caprices of the main power blocs within the PDP. For instance, the various reconciliatory efforts of the party to avert another defeat in the 2023 general election failed to nib in the bud the crisis over the presidential ticket of the PDP. Mr Peter Obi and Musa Kwankwaso defected to the Labour Party and the NNPP respectively to contest the election. Again, the activities and recommendations of the reconciliation committees sometimes become a subject of controversy such that the initial aim of setting up the body is defeated.
PDP’s list of misfortunes
In 1999, the PDP roared into power after winning 21 states and the presidential election. It won in all the six states in the South-South, five states in the South-East and 10 of the 19 states in the northern part of the country. Next to the PDP was the then All peoples Party (APP) which triumphed in nine states: Zamfara, Yobe, Sokoto, Kwara, Kogi, Kebbi, Jigawa, Gombe, and Borno while the AD secured the entire South-West states Osun, Oyo, Ondo, Ekiti, Ogun, and Lagos states.
In 2003, the PDP did not only retain the centre but it also increased the number of states in its kitty by winning seven more states. However, a court later invalidated its victory in Anambra States following the petition filed by the APGA. A castrated AD could only secure Lagos State. A metamorphosed APP to ANPP won seven states: Borno, Jigawa, Kano, Kebbi, Sokoto, Yobe and Zamfara.
Between 2007 and 2011, the number rose to 31 states. As of May 30, 2007, the PDP had 31 states under its control namely Abia, Adamawa, Anambra, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Benue, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Gombe, Imo, Jigawa, Kaduna, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, Kwara, Nasarawa, Niger, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Plateau, Rivers, Sokoto, Taraba and Zamfara. While the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) had Yobe, Kano, Bauchi, and Borno states, the defunct Action Congress (AC) had only Lagos.
Those electoral fortunes by the PDP began to nosedive following internal sabotage and crises occasioned by lack of internal democracy and arrogance of a few of its leaders. Gradually, the party lost grip of the political lever of the country. A perturbed founding father of the party and former Vice-President, the late Dr. Alex Ekwueme, was astounded by the setback that PDP had become, noting: “We found it difficult to manage the party as a mass movement; unfortunately, some people who did not know how the party was formed, turned it into a personal estate. They wanted to use my state, Anambra, to do re-registration, to exclude some people who did not agree with them. Others (political parties) were attracting new members, they were driving away members. The party (PDP) lacked internal democracy. Umaru Yar’Adua came and called me and others. We went round and brought back aggrieved members. Yar’Adua died and we didn’t conclude that assignment.”
Balance of power
There is disequilibrium in the parties in relation to the balance of power. Both centripetal and centrifugal forces prevent the opposition on the need and merits in a convergence of efforts. There is also the ethnic dimension and mechanism of political contingency called zoning. For example, leadership struggle forced former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and the seven governors of Adamawa, Kwara, Sokoto, Jigawa, Kano, Rivers and Niger States to stage a walkout at the PDP’s national convention held in Abuja in 2013. There was also the power game between a former governor of Borno State and one-time chairman of PDP, Senator Ali Modi Sheriff and Senator Ahmed Makarfi. The frosty relationship between Governor Nyesome Wike and Uche Secondus that weakened the PDP, as well as the rage between Ayorchia Ayu, Atiku and the five PDP governors otherwise referred to as G5 governors that worked against the party at the poll in 2023.
It will be recalled that the PDP could not overcome the schism and crevices created by the 2023 national convention to pick a presidential candidate. Apart from Obi and Kwankwaso that pulled out the PDP, the party had to contend with the sustained protest led by the then Rivers State governor, Nyesome Wike four other governors; Governor Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu), Samuel Ortom (Benue) and Seyi Makinde of Oyo State. The party lost Abia to LP, Benue to APC, Sokoto to APC, Enugu to LP at the initial stage before it was upturned by the court. The emergence of Atiku as the presidential candidate in 2022 erupted a chain reaction in the party, which led to the breakaway of five governors including Seyi Makinde of Oyo State, Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State, Samuel Ortom of Benue State and Nyesom Wike of Rivers State. All governors withdrew their support for the party and the candidate, saying that they won’t support a candidate from the North. PDP lost the election as Wike battled the PDP, including joining the opposition government without technically joining the opposition party.
Nonetheless, the PDP has consistently made conscious efforts to restore peace and stability in the party. It sets committees, among them, the 2016 Dickson/Mantu-led reconciliation committee, the Jerry Gana-led strategy review and inter-party affairs committee, the 2017 Dankwanbo/ Wike reconciliation committee, the Seriake Dickson standing committee on reconciliation, the Bala Mohammed-led post-2019 election committee, the Saraki-led national reconciliation and strategy committee, the PDP post-2015 election review committee also known as the Ekweremadu panel; the Ugwuanyi-led zoning committee, the Samuel Ortom-led zoning committee.
NNPP: Still embroiled in litigation
Founded by a businessman, Dr Boniface Aniebolam in 2002, the NNPP had almost remained in the shadow of itself, due to its inability to win elections. It was no surprise that the founder was later mired in a controversy with a former minister and ex-governor of Kano State, Musa Kwankwaso, over the control of the soul and machinery of the NNPP.
Aniebolam said he singlehandedly registered and nurtured the NNPP from 2002 until 2022 when Kwankwaso and his team approached him to fly the flag of the party in the 2023 presidential election. “Buba Galadima led the delegation, including Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi and Professor Sam Angai to my country hone in Anambra, to plead for us to accept Kwankwaso in NNPP. I believe that Kwankwaso was not aware of the internal crisis in the party until he came out openly on live television, displaying new logo and flag for the NNPP and mutilating its constitution.”
That is to show the indication of discontent and suspicion in the NNPP. It has led to claims and counterclaims, accusations and counter accusations, as well as expulsions and counter-expulsions and counterforce. It has also degenerated into a litany of litigation, with Aniebolam threatening to go as far as the Supreme Court over issues bordering on the constitution of the NNPP. In addition, some of its state excos are experiencing one conflict or another.
LP: A labour of crisis?
The crisis in the LP has assumed a three dimensional structure. The leadership is involved in bitter struggle with the leadership of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC). On another hand, the leadership of the party is at logger head with Governor Alex Otti over the legitimacy of the existing party structures at all levels. The governor says their tenure has lapsed and therefore, he convened a stakeholders’ meeting in the state capital last week to set up a national caretaker committee with a former minister of finance, Nenadi Usman as chairman. Its mandate is to reorganise and reposition the party, and the committee is given 90 days to carry out its assignment. The Abure leadership of the party questioned the governor on why he derived the power to convene such meeting. He said all the action taken at the Awka meeting was null and void as the party has held a legitimate national convention in Nnewi in Anambra State where the present executive was reaffirmed. Ironically, Mr Peter Obi was the one assigned to announce the senator as the interim chairman of the caretaker committee, where the Abuja-led LP had expressly endorsed Obi as the LP presidential candidate for the 2027 poll. The interpretation in some circles is that there could be a plot to split the party into factions to pave the way for certain elements to form alliances with other like-minds desirous of a more formidable and national structure and platform for the next elections.
In the LP, there is hide and seek between the loyalists of peter Obi under the name Obidient Movement and the leadership of the party. Some allies of the ex-presidential candidate are averse to the movement being subsumed in the party. They are suspicious of the intention of certain power brokers in the LP to integrate the pressure group under the party structure for what they called proper harmonization, coordination and collaboration. However, the position of Obi on the power tussle in the party has become another issue of debate in the party. Some are accusing him of double speak over the internal rumbling within the party following what he said not too long ago when he paid a solidarity visit to the party’s leadership at the National Headquarters in Abuja. It was at the event that he reportedly joined party members to endorse the newly elected National Working Committee of the Labour Party led by Mr Julius Abure. In appreciation of the visit, Abure told Obi and others, “It was high time the varying groups of dissent voices over the Nnewi convention came together and set all their interests aside to work for a party that would make a good show in the next election season….The convention has come and gone, all those who are still angry with us over the Nnewi convention, we want to appeal to them, that they should all come together to work with us to build the party for a new Nigeria that has a vision.”
Concerns of stakeholders
The tragedy of inconsistency remains the bane within the circle of PDP heavyweights. While they retained their membership of the party, they sometimes engaged in blatant anti-party behaviours and worked for rival parties in the buildup to the last elections. Such leaders openly identified and canvassed for votes for the candidates of the other parties. They vigorously pushed for divisive issues and tendencies that further polarised the PDP before and after the elections. Therefore the cumulative votes garnered by the PDP, Labour Party and the NNPP which surpassed the eight million votes of the APC could have done the magic for the PDP if such anti-party behaviours had not been brazen, pervasive and condoned.
A former deputy national chairman of PDP, Chief Olabode George used the chance of his nomination into the disciplinary committee set up by the party with a former minister of Foreign Affairs, Chief Tom Ikimi named as chairman, to expatiate on the Nemesis of the PDP over the years. George lamented the way inordinate ambition by a few has suffocated the PDP and compounded its electoral woes. He also decried the debasement of the shared values and vision of the founding fathers of the party by a few power mongers, just as he is miffed by the apparent sideling of some leaders to please others. On the PDP disciplinary committee, he declared: “I can’t serve under him (Ikimi), because when did he join the party? We know within ourselves the various groupings that are dividing the party, that’s what the party should sit down first and resolve. I know Tom very well; he met me in this party. The founding fathers handed over to us. So the culture of the party, the do’s and don’ts are with us. So you don’t make me be a member under somebody that I know in terms of hierarchy of the party, and say I should go and serve under him.
“I made that observation to them. I will not serve under Ikimi. I’m being very frank. How much information or depth does he have concerning our party? You don’t do things like that. It’s an observation and I’ve told the Chairman. Just setting up a committee, where will it lead you?”
George further explained his decision to reject his membership of the committee. He refused to be subordinated by those who came to join him and founding members of the party. He also promised his decision to turn down the appointment on the uncanny power game in the party. He said: “The chairman of that committee is from one group, and the secretary of the committee is from the same group, so am I just to go there and sit and look like some undecided animal? We need to do a fundamental review of what went wrong during the last elections, come up with solutions, and reunite everybody because a divided house will always remain a defeated house.”
A former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alhaji Sule Lamido also spoke on the predicaments of the PDP, especially in recent years. He described the party as the beacon of hope for Nigerians, but was seriously worried about the discreet efforts of some forces to destroy the party. He claimed: “People have been hired to destroy the PDP but we are making every effort, because right now, we have people who are anti-PDP. Imagine people like Ortom (former Benue State governor) saying ‘our leader, Wike, has said we will vote Tinubu in 2027’. Imagine someone in the PDP saying he is going to take a cue from Wike to vote Tinubu in 2027. People who are in the PDP are also working for the APC and Tinubu. So, it is a very difficult thing. We are working hard to find people who share a similar concern because those in the party who are now in government are not on the same frequency with us.”
Damagun, Wike, others
All the chairmen of the opposition parties are under intense pressure to either resign or quit following the expiration of tenure. Abure of the LP remains stoic in his position that those demanding that he quits to pave the wave for the conduct of a fresh national convention are missing the point. The Social Democratic Party is still subdued by the bitter struggle for its leadership that tailed into the general election last year. For the PDP, the acting chairman is confronted by pressure from those he called proxy interests, internal imposition and agents of destruction within the party that he steps aside.“For those interested in seeing Umru Damagun go, this is a buildup to undermine me before the coming NEC meeting. But if you bring Damagun down and lose the party, what have you achieved because in trying to bring me down, you are also bringing down your party? Every time people say the party is dying, they are sending a message to the opposition that we are weak. If you believe in the party, you should speak positively, unless you are an agent of destruction; you should be positive whenever you talk if you believe in this party,” he said.
A similar concern on the situation in the PDP has been expressed the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the PDP under the leadership of a former president of the Senate, Senator Adolphus Wabara. He welcomed the setting up of two committees in the move to reposition the PDP and frustrate any move to turn Nigeria to a one-party state. “This party,’ he said, “should not be allowed to die in the hands of these two committees. So, I sincerely urge the two committees to function without fear or favour, no matter whose ox is gored, and as much as our Constitution—the Constitution of this great party—guides whatever decisions or actions you will take; failure of which, in my considered opinion, will lead to Nigeria becoming a one-party state with no democracy.”
He said: “Discipline is a requirement for efficiency in any organization, including political parties. But for some time now, there has been a proliferation of gross indiscipline, which has caused the party electoral misfortune. The fundamental problem of the PDP in the 2023 election was gross indiscipline.”
Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola described reconciliation as a shared responsibility, urging party members to embrace peace. He said: “PDP is a beacon of hope for national progress,” advising the chieftains to Bury their differences. Our challenges may be many, but they are not insurmountable. We can’t help our people unless we win elections, and we can’t win elections without having a strong party. Nigerians need the PDP to rescue the country.”
Wike has said he was bathing an eyelid over speculation that he was planning to leave the PDP because he does not run from a fight. Wike said: “I don’t run away from any fight. I will stay there; I will fight it out. Who am I going to run from, the vampires? I cannot do that. I will not leave PDP, even when the fight at home (Rivers State) and at the national level gets tougher. I will fight to the last. I am not prepared to join the APC. I have said it and I want to repeat it. The work I am doing here was handed over to me by the president. And I am focused on achieving the task before me. I will not fold my arms and allow the party I have suffered for over the years to continuously do injustice to members. I will not accept that.”
It is apparent that the opposition parties are at a crossroads. They still pay lip service to resolving their individual internal combustions and other domestic challenges to pave the way of building bridges of understanding, cooperation and collaboration with 2027 on their minds.
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