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From Romanus Ugwu, Abuja
The outcome of last month’s off-cycle governorship elections in Kogi, Imo, and Bayelsa states, which apparently was a two or three-horse race, has reawakened fresh debate over the relevance and otherwise of a multi-party system in Nigeria’s democratic process.
Replica of the general elections held earlier this year and even the previous years, only very few political parties were visible contenders during the polls in the states.
According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), almost all the 19 currently registered political parties fielded candidates for the governorship elections, but expectedly, about 15 of them collectively managed to garner a significant percentage of the total number of votes cast.
From Kogi State to even Imo and Bayelsa, the election was a straight battle between and among the All Progressives Congress (APC), the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and either the Labour Party (LP) or the Social Democratic Party (SDP).
The visibility of the other political parties, only felt during their campaigns, was literally insignificant when the votes on the ballot boxes were counted and announced. The outcome of the election, again reduced many of the parties into mere political platforms to serve the pecuniary interests of some members.
Regardless of how the strong parties manipulated the election process, statistics showed that the majority of the candidates and their political parties, lost right in their polling units in such circumstances that signified, in the consideration of their people, that they did not really participate in the electoral contests.
Although the trend of relegating smaller parties to such negligible positions was as old as the successive republics in the Nigeria democratic space, bookmakers still find it astounding how only two, three, or at most four political parties would make such a domineering impact out of the several other registered parties during elections.
From the first to the current fourth republics, the trend of very insignificant few political parties riding roughshod on others has become part of Nigeria’s electoral process in the journey of her democratic experiments.
Historically, in the first republics, despite having a total number of 21 registered political parties, only five of them, namely, Action Group (AG), Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC), Northern Elements Progressive Union (NEPU) Northern People’s Congress (NPC), and Northern Progressive Front (NPF) were strong and vibrant.
Others like Dynamic Party (DP), Kano People’s Party (KPP), Midwest Democratic Front (MDF), National Independence Party (NIP), Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP), Republican Party (RP), United Middle Belt Congress (UMBC), and United National Independence Party (UNIP) among many others were more or less there to make up numbers.
In the second republic, however, there was some semblance of competition among the seven registered political parties, yet about three or four of them, comprising National Party of Nigeria (NPN), Nigerian People’s Party (NPP), People’s Redemption Party (PRP) and Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), were actively visible.
Some others like Greater Nigerian People’s Party (GNPP), Movement of the People Party (MPP), and Nigeria Advance Party (NAP) didn’t actually pose serious threats to the other stronger parties.
The short-lived third republic with only two political parties, National Republican Convention (NRC) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) midwifed by then Military President, Ibrahim Babangida, did not fall into such historical perspectives and narrative.
The scenario was slightly different under the Sani Abacha military era where the five registered political parties, popularly and derogatorily described as the five leprous fingers, were manipulated during the elections to ensure Abacha’s transmutation to a democratically-elected president.
After the inauguration of then eight-member National Electoral Commission of Nigeria (NECON), the Abacha government had registered the five political parties, comprising Committee for National Consensus (CNC), United Nigeria People’s Convention (UNPC), National Centre Party of Nigeria (NCPN), Democratic Party of Nigeria (DPN), and Grassroots Democratic Movement (GDM), but the elections were devoid of any stiff competition in the real sense of it as it was characterised by remote manipulative forces.
In the fourth republics, although nine political parties contested the four rounds of elections held in 1999 under the transition midwifed by General Abdulsalam Abubakar, only three parties, the PDP; the All People’s Party (APP) – later All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP); and the Alliance for Democracy (AD), actively contested the National, State Assembly, governorship and presidential elections.
The rhythm was the same in the 2011 general elections where the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) and Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) which later transmuted to APC in 2015, among many other parties only posed a feeble threat to the PDP.
In what could be described as a strange multi-party system, only perhaps five out of a whopping 68 political parties registered by INEC were visible during the 2019 general elections, especially during the presidential poll where then newly-registered APC dismantled the hitherto giant party, the PDP.
However, scandalised by the feeble outing and performances of the multitude of the registered political parties during the 2019 general elections, INEC had furiously deregistered and reduced the parties to a sizeable number of 18 that contested the 2023 general elections.
But, despite the trimmed number, the 2023 poll still remained largely a contest among four political parties, APC, PDP, LP and New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) with the rest 14 that only existed in nomenclature, remaining largely as endorsement parties.
Many political watchers may have applauded the electoral umpire for upholding the democratic tenets of operating a multi-party system but the performances of the political parties from the historical narratives, has called to question the importance of retaining the high number of parties, calling for review.
Today, the registered parties still standing include Accord (A), Action Alliance (AA), Action Democratic Party (ADP), Action Peoples Party (APP), African Action Congress (AAC), African Democratic Congress (ADC), APC, All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and Allied Peoples Movement (APM).
Others are Boot Party (BP), LP, PDP, People’s Redemption Party (PRP), SDP, Young Progressives Party (YPP), NNPP, National Rescue Movement (NRM), Zenith Labour Party (ZLP) and the latest addition, Youth Party (YP).
Remarkably, despite the relative reduction in the number of political parties, only very few are still clearly visible and vibrant, while several others seem to be moribund, obscure, and or exist only perhaps in the briefcases as election financial merchants for the owners.
To worsen the already bad situation, the recent request by over 74 political associations, seeking registration into political parties before the electoral umpire, has renewed fresh debate on the need for an unregulated over-bloated number of parties in a multi-party democracy.
Instructively, the last of this trend may not have been seen because even if the electoral commission shows reluctance to increase the number of registered political parties, the law courts and schemes from powerful politicians strongly backed by the government of the day will force more parties on the electoral umpire.
Frowning against the request by the 74 political associations, INEC, while kicking against the registration of more weak political parties, described some of the existing ones as briefcase parties.
Commission’s Director, Department of Election and Party Monitoring, Hauwa Habib, while explaining the rigours involved in registering a political party, said that the proponents must have a membership of 24 people from 24 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
She said: “We see them as ‘briefcase political parties’. Sometimes the Chairman and the Secretary hijack the party because they registered it from inception. All the members were not necessarily financial members. The chairman, secretary, and treasurer continue to dominate everything about the political party. In their constitutions, they assign duties and schedules to every executive member. The Financial Secretary, Welfare Secretary, and Publicity Secretary are not allowed to perform their duties once the party is registered.
“In the long run, when it is a year or two towards election, you find the secretary and the chairman struggling on who owns the party. Thereabout, you find factionalisation, they give us problems during elections and rush to the courts that are not helping matters.
“There was a political party in 2018 that got registered with only four members while Section 223 of the constitution tells you that it is 24 members minimum in 24 states and FCT. Now, these people are all from the South-West, there are four of them. They went to court and the court insisted that they should be on the ballot paper. Of course, they have been deregistered because they are not a serious political party.”
Defending the commission’s insistence on the rules of engagement, she said: “they think that membership of a political party in Nigeria is a joke. It is through the political parties that governance and government are given to citizens. How do you think a political party with 24 people running the party can perform without a presence at the local level during elections?”
But, despite how logical the standpoint of the electoral commission on how relevant multi-party system could be, the umpire, according to the former chairman of Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC), High Chief Peter Ameh, should take the larger chunk of the blame for the failure of the system.
A strong proponent of multi-party democracy, Ameh, in a chat with Daily Sun, claimed that lack of funding and instances of the commission acting as fake agents to protect those in power, account for the larger percentage of whatever challenges confronting the system.
“Multi-party system is the way to go. It will checkmate the possibility of having a dominant party with dictatorial tendencies. It affords people the opportunity of having a multiplicity of choices. We should understand that a political party is not just a vehicle for participation in the democratic process.
“A restricted or one-party system will close the channel against many young Nigerians gaining democratic experiments. I didn’t join politics through the big parties, it was through PPA. Multi-party system afforded young Nigerians the platform to sharpen their political knowledge and give society those things rooted in our subconscious.
“There is nowhere in the world where democracy has survived that it did not thrive based on multi-party system. It is the best choice, the method to go and any attempt to operate a restricted, controlled party system will further hinder the growth of young people in the democratic process,” Ameh argued.
While defending the system further, the secretary of Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) said: “You talk about visibility as the inability of parties to perform. The truth is that they don’t have equal media attention and INEC has not also provided the enabling environment for them to perform and flourish.
“One of the cardinal and critical ingredients for a multi-party democracy to thrive is the presence of credible, free, and fair electoral processes. But if it becomes about the powerful or those with the authority of the state suppressing other parties, then there will not be an opportunity for people to register a new party to compete with those with the money for our collective use.
“They usually use the money meant for all of us to suppress Nigerians. In states like Kogi and Imo for instance, the governors have weaponised violence in desperation to hold on to power. The big question is how parties without war chest and power, will compete with such people in terms of visibility.
“The failure of multi-party system in Nigeria is the inability of the government to act in the general interests and good of the people. And in the failure of government, INEC with the right of an umpire has acted as fake agents to protect those in power.
“INEC has continued to frustrate multi-party democracy as exemplified in its vehement refusal to provide the needed materials before the expiration of the 21-day deadline for the complainants to prove their cases in the law court. If it has conducted elections freely and fairly, in the interest of the people, it doesn’t need to hide anything. If this issue persists, be sure that more parties will die a natural death.”
Notwithstanding the side of the divide the pendulum for the desirability of the system swings, what has remained indisputable, in the consideration of many observers, was that most of the applicants behind the demands for registration of new parties were and still are motivated by selfish and monetary interests.
To give credence to this assertion, the demands for the registration of parties were very high when the constitution compelled the electoral commission to give certain funds to the political parties.
However, when the game changed, the applicants shifted their interest to the mercantilism of using the endorsements of bigger parties for financial reward and ultimately selling party tickets to desperate politicians at exorbitant rates under the disguise of expression of interest and nomination forms.
Many of them are surviving by providing financially rewarding alternative platforms to distressed politicians who could not secure the tickets to be the candidates of their political parties, relying, in most cases, on waiver caveats in their constitutions.
Again, defending the system, Ameh, a chieftain of LP, said that; “lack of finance is also a big challenge. At the beginning of the fourth republic, political parties used to have access to state funds, but it was later stopped with the stipulation of May instead of Shall. That was how INEC stopped funding parties.
“And when it happened, we thought we would return to the era when citizens give money to support the growth and development of the parties. But, the process did not work because those in government were using state resources to bribe the people, making them question why some parties should be giving them money but others requesting it from them.
“For multi-party system to work, we need to have a deliberate policy to stop vote buying and prosecute those who use state resources to manipulate our electoral process. There must be consequences for those who engage in such.
“As for the alliances and endorsements, you talked about, they have never been the reason multi-party democracy fails all over the world. Yes, there could be selfish interests behind the formation of the parties, but when there is a general rule to protect everyone and INEC becomes a truly independent organisation that will work for the general interest, not for those in power.”
