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The just concluded primary elections across the political party space in Nigeria have revealed a deep malaise that has stunted the growth and development of democracy 27 years after the transition from military to civil democratic rule in 1999. What began with a riotous electoral law, which imposed a direct primary election system as against the delegate system, has exposed the underbelly of the political party system in Nigeria as the weakest link in Nigeria’s democratic value chain. Without an exception, the major political parties in Nigeria, from the ruling APC to opposition ADC, NDC, PDP and others, all failed the basic test of internal democratic practices when they mostly conducted sham direct primary elections in a manner that now puts most political parties in the basket of rotten fruits.
For the purpose of clarity, a direct primary election system is one in which all registered members of a political party are expected to directly elect candidates of their choice into all elective positions going into a general election. On the other hand, the indirect primary election mode is one in which all registered members of political parties will first elect delegates and these delegates will in turn go ahead to elect candidates of the parties for the various elective positions in a given electoral season. Historically, the indirect mode of primary elections has been the norm in Nigeria since 1999, even though political parties are usually at liberty to choose their preferred system. But, curiously, the direct primary mode was legislated as the only prescribed method by law, if political parties cannot reach a consensus among aspirants.
To an average Nigerian observing the current travesty of direct primary elections across board, it might appear as though the indirect mode of primary election was better and more democratic. But for anybody that is familiar with the internal workings of the political party system in Nigeria, it is an unspoken truth that the indirect mode of primary election is as undemocratic and awed as the so-called direct primary. And the only reason the ruling APC influenced its passage into law in the National Assembly was to relieve the political system of the burden of a monetized primary election where delegates are usually on sale to the highest bidder. The direct primary election system allows the owners of party structure the rare opportunity to eat their cake and still have it by being able to impose candidates at no cost.
The bigger question to the non-initiate political observer is: how was this charade made possible in an otherwise open system that entails popular participation of all registered members of political par- ties? The simple answer is that there is hardly any political party in Nigeria with a credible membership register. So actual membership is determined by the pre-in- stalled party executives from ward to state levels, irrespective of what is contained in the register. And with these party executives acting as puppets of the owners of the political structures [mostly governors] in the case of ruling parties and former ‘’this and that’’ in the case of the opposition, primary elections, whether direct or indirect, become an exercise of working from answer to question, as the end is pre-determined before the beginning.
However, while ruling parties can afford the excesses of rendering their internal democratic processes undemocratic, one would have thought the opposition would do otherwise. But, sadly, the opposition in Nigeria has become part of Nigeria’s problem of arrested democratic growth and development 27 years after the advent of the Fourth Republic. Democracy stands on the two legs of government and opposition. And while it is true that Nigeria’s democracy has suffered from failure of government, what many Nigerians may not have realized is that Nigeria is also afflicted with failure of opposition. But while failure of government attracts more concern, failure of opposition is rarely talked about.
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Whereas parties are supposed to serve as the brain box of a democracy and be above board like Caesar’s wife because it is the platform where ideas are synthesized into policy propositions with an ideological clarity that seeks to improve on the welfare and security of the Nigerian people through a well-de ned path to security and prosperity for all.
Unfortunately, most political parties in Nigeria are nothing but special purpose vehicles for contesting elections with scant or no attention to building ideologically coherent and ethical political organizations. As long as the end justifies the means, Nigerian politicians can’t be bothered.
And whereas, the ruling party imposed the indirect primary mode of elections as a fait accompli through the 2026 Electoral Act, the opposition should have leveraged this to strengthen its internal electoral processes and conduct all-inclusive primary elections that would see the party structures gaining broad democratic legitimacy, which would thrust them ahead of the ruling party with massive pool of people power going into the 2027 general election. To also enhance and brighten their prospects of a successful electoral outing, the opposition in Nigeria should have transformed into ideologically-inclined political parties where membership will be by conviction, rather than convenience. Any serious-minded political party truly interested in the democratic salvation of Nigeria should have known that it was important to x the problem of the political party system in order to rebuild the Nigerian nation from bottom to top. The three years between the 2023 elections and the one year before the 2027 general election was more than enough time to build a political party in its truest sense.
This is because a awed primary election process can never produce credible candidates for election into political leadership positions that require the highest standards of ethics, morality and integrity for the government to serve public interest. Internal electoral banditry across political parties will surely result in general electoral banditry on Election Day. And electoral banditry will install executive and legislative bandits across the arms of government, whose incompetence and corruption will continue to sustain bandits on Nigeria’s highways, farmlands, schools, villages and forests.
With most political parties in Nigeria maintaining the same operating system of impunity and undemocratic internal processes of democracy, the hope of national rebirth looks like a mirage, as whichever political party dominates the other in the next round of elections will not translate into anything different from the current situation.
In fact, the 2027 general election might be another lost opportunity at democratic rebirth as both the ruling party and opposition parties are essentially same of the same in their misconduct, impunity and ideological bankruptcy. A political party that cannot ensure the integrity of its membership register enough to conduct a credible primary election cannot conduct the affairs of a nation with integrity.
