Opposition parties on throes of death ahead 2027

By Chidiebere Onyemaizu

Three years to Nigeria’s next election cycle, impotent opposition to the party at the centre, the All Progressives Congress, APC assails the tenets of multi- party democracy which the country practices.

Consequently, concerns about the possibility of Nigeria sliding into a one-party state mount following the opposition’s seeming paralysis and waves of defections to the ruling party.

The absence of formidable,  purposeful, robust,  virile and coordinated opposition to the APC-led Federal Government, according to political analysts, is a a huge deficit in Nigeria’s political process.

Pundits believe that the situation signposts a disturbing negation of the traditional role of the opposition in a democracy. This role includes constantly keeping the ruling party on its toes through criticisms of perceived bad government policies and proffering alternative and better solutions to national problems.

Many believe that opposition parties, particularly the main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, is suffering either self imposed or externally orchestrated paralysis to prevent it from offering effective disruptive or constructive opposition to the APC.

Besides the fire-spitting opposition in the First republic, the last time Nigeria experienced something resembling a strong and coordinated opposition politics was in the run up to the 2015 presidential election when an amalgam of fringe opposition parties combined with the then Tinubu’s Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN to form the APC which went ahead to dislodge the PDP from power.

In the First republic, the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo and his Action Group, AG, and Mallam Aminu Kano’s Northern Elements Progressive Union, NEPU were thorns on the flesh of the NPC/ NCNC led coalition government of Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe and Sir Tafawa Belewa. With its constant criticism of the central government, the AG was akin to a government-in- waiting, an alternate government sort of.

And towards the 1964 federal elections, a ground coalition of opposition parties under the aegis of the United Progressives Alliance, UPGA not only fought the election but brought the NPC and the parties allied to it to their knees.

In the Second republic, the opposition led by Chief Awolowo of the  Unity Party of Nigeria, UPN, gave the then ruling party, the National Party of Nigeria, NPN, hard tackles, constantly proving government policies wrong and proffering alternative policies. Minus Zik and his Nigerian Peoples Party, NPP which was in alliance with the NPN, Malam Aminu Kano, leader of the PRP and Alhaji Ibrahim Waziri of the GNPP-all opposition leaders- equally stood up to the ruling party uncompromisingly.

But in the current dispensation, the opposition presents a picture of a body on the throes of avoidable death. Waves of defections have since inception of the Tinubu government beset opposition parties, particularly the erstwhile ruling party, the PDP. Virtually all the defectors berthed at the APC. Analysts opine that the unsettling situation raises fears about Nigeria’s gradual slide into a one-party state.

As unpopular as the one- a party system is, some APC leaders are already upbeat about the idea. For example, while welcoming the former Deputy National chairman of the PDP, Shauibu Oyedokun and other chieftains of the PDP in Osun State into the APC, Minister for Marine and Blue Economy and the immediate past governor of the state, Adegbeyoga Oyetola declared the PDP dead in Osun.

Similarly, the Ebonyi State Governor, Francis Nwifuru, apparently buoyed by the avalanche of defections of PDP leaders in the state to the APC, advocated for the institution of a party system in the state.

Across the states where the APC holds sway, the voices of the opposition which ought to keep the governors on their toes are either feeble or out-rightly nonexistent as prominent members of the opposition expected to lend such voices have either resigned from their respective parties or turned coat and joined the APC.

In Imo State, for instance, Governor Hope Uzodimma is having a rosy ride as there is virtually no longer an opposition in the state to breathe down his neck. A chieftain of the PDP, the main opposition party in the state, who pleaded anonymity told the Daily Sun that “our party has suffered serious haemorrhage and paralysis and we are concerned about the situation because it would appear that we no longer have a voice.”

The state’s former governor and former Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt.Hon.Emeka Ihedioha resigned from the party recently triggering a wave of resignations of other party stalwarts including Air Commodore Luke Ochulor (retd.); former deputy governor, Gerald Irona; former ministers, Charles Ugwuh and Chief Chuka Odom; PDP Board of Trustees member, Chris Okewulonu; former member of the PDP National Executive Council, Henry Ekpe; former members of House of Representatives, ThankGod Ezeani, Mayor Eze, Uche Onyeagucha, Ugonna Ozurigbo, Obinna Onwubuariri, and Jonas Okeke; Chairman and Secretary of PDP Elders Committee, Prof Jude Njoku and Prof Obioma Iheduru.

Also resigned were members of the South-East Zonal Executive Committee,  Chief Ekezie, and Chief Augustine Elochukwu; two senatorial candidates of the party in the 2023 general election, including Chief Emmanuel Okewulonu; four House of Representatives candidates of the party in the last election, including, Chibuzo Agulanna; former Speaker and Deputy Speaker of Imo State  House of Assembly, Lawman Duruji, and Okey Onyekamma, 24 former local council chairmen, and about 291 Interim Management Committee members, who served under the Ihedioha administration. Others were over 2,277 top leaders and financiers of the party across the state; 29 out of 39 members of the State Executive Committee; 13 out of 27 PDP council chairmen; 267 out of 432 PDP council officers; 243 out of 305 ward chairmen; over 3,888 ward executives of the party.

Ironically, Ihedioha cited PDP’s refusal to offer a robust opposition to the APC as a reason for his exit.

Many Nigerians are bemused as to why the PDP and other opposition parties are not playing the  opposition role to the APC and the Tinubu administration. Instead,  what could pass as whimpers of opposition against the ruling party are the voices of the presidential candidates of the PDP and the Labour party in last year’s election, Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi. Both opposition figures occasionally criticise some policies of the Tinubu government.

Even the usually vibrant PDP Governor’s Forum which proved a bulwark against former President Muhammadu Buhari’s APC-led government, according to political analysts, now presents a picture of a tamed, pliant lion.

Whether the opposition is deliberately, for pecuniary reasons, engaging in self-immolation aimed at paving the way for a one-party arrangement that will guarantee the APC an easy, unopposed sail to Aso Rock in 2027 is hard to decipher but willful abdication of its constitutional role in a democracy brings to the fore Joseph Stalin’s devious attitude to the opposition: “ If the opposition disarms, well and good. If it refused to disarm, we disarm it ourselves”

The foregoing reinforces insinuations that the opposition may have actually disarmed itself following an alleged APC strategic 2027 deal with opposition governors. Under the deal, Daily Sun gathered,  the opposition governors, while not outrightly defecting to APC, are required to get their parties to offer no opposition to the president. The governors themselves are to align with the policies of the Tinubu administration,  refrain from criticising him and lend support to his policies. In return, those of them who are in their first term in office has been promised a seamless, effortless second term re-election whether or not they formally defect to the APC, and those of them in their final terms in office, a juicy role in Tinubu’s second term.

This alleged pact, Daily Sun was informed, was at the heart of the Supreme court triumph of all the opposition governors and the reason they all, in their post victory speeches, commended President Tinubu for not interfering in the judicial process leading to their victories. However, keen observers of the Tinubu administration are of the view that trade-offs and compromises with the opposition will do little or nothing to determine the fate of the president in 2027. Rather, they argue that how creditably the President steers Nigeria out of the current economic quagmire will determine his fate in 2027.

Besides the alleged pact, many believe that the inertia of the PDP as a major opposition party and the internecine crisis in some of its state chapters have the imprimatur of the APC. The ruling party, through its PDP proxies multiple party sources informed Daily Sun, is resolute in castrating the main opposition party and rendering it weak, disoriented and disunited ahead 2027.

The Minister for FCT and the immediate past River State Governor, Nyesom Wike has severally been accused of working against the interest of the party for denying him its 2023 presidential ticket.

Many point to the political crisis in the state which pitched him against his successor and godson, Governor Siminalayi Fubara as evidence of Wike’s deliberate act of sabotage against the PDP.

A PDP chieftain serving in an APC Federal Government, to enjoy the unwavering loyalty of his supporters in both parties, Wike,  according to watchers of the unfolding political spat in Rivers, has created a novel hybrid political system in the state which makes it difficult to distinguish between the two parties.

Analysts opine that, though Wike’s heart is more with the APC than the PDP, his refusal to formally defect to the former is a deft political move to, firstly maintain a firm control of both parties in the state and secondly, weaken Rivers PDP by preventing his political enemies in the APC from defecting to the party. A PDP chieftain in the state told Daily Sun that the likes of former Governor Chibuike Amaechi will immediately return to the PDP, take control of it and rebuild it the moment Wike formally leaves the party.

With eyes fixed on 2027, President Tinubu’s foot soldiers, Daily Sun gathered, advised him to exploit the political crisis in the state to his advantage by resisting Wike’s camp’s pressure to declare a state of emergency in Rivers with the aim to truncate Governor Fubara’s government. The President was allegedly further advised to court the River State governor while at the same time informally recognizing the governor’s godfather, Wike, as political leader of the state.

This, the Daily Sun was told, accounted for the Presidency’s recent statement declaring that it would resist any attempt to frustrate the smooth operation of the Fubara government.

In the same vein, in line with its recognition of the FCT Minister as the de facto political leader of River State, the presidency has given the FCT Minister the sole right to nominate all federal appointees from the state, hence his loyalists now saturate a plethora of federal agencies.

By maintaining the delicate balance in relating with the two protagonists in the Rivers debacle, analysts say the president aims at having the two leaders beholden to him for different reasons-Wike for being accorded the unprecedented status of a political godfather and Governor Fubara for the president’s statesmanship in not supporting his impeachment or removal via state of emergency. The likely scenario is that come 2027, both Wike and Fubara will show gratitude by working for the President’s reelection, despite belonging to the PDP.

As for Labour party, not a few believe that the intractable crisis in the party was not stirred by the APC and targeted at Obi. Believing that Obi would again utilize the LP vehicle for the 2027 presidential election, the APC allegedly procured the Lamidi Apapa and NLC factions of the party to polarise it, weaken it, cause it to disintegrate and thus pave the way for its elected officials across the country to defect to the APC on the account of crisis in their party.

To eviscerated Obi’s political base, a phantom factional ward executive of the Labour party in his Agulu community in Anambra, it has been alleged, will soon emerge to expel him from the party for alleged anti-party activities.

Meanwhile, a Northern youth group, the Northern Youth Leaders Forum, NYLF has alleged that PDP leaders are complicit in what it described as a deliberate effort to hoist the one-party system in the country. The group specifically accused the Acting National Chairman of the PDP, Ambassador Ilya Umar Damagun, of allegedly working in concert with the APC to bring about a one-party system in the country.

The NYLF National President, Afiyo Elliot at a press conference recently rued that the PDP as Nigeria’s main opposition party, has failed to voice criticisms against perceived unpopular policies of the Tinubu administration.

“The National Chairman of the party, who is supposed to be the main opposition leader, providing constructive criticisms to ensure checks and balances, is unavoidably absent or has been on a deliberate, intentional, and manipulated silence,” Elliot lamented.

However, Chief Chekwas Okorie, the founding National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA and founder of the United Progressives Party, UPP has allayed fears of a possibility of one party state in Nigeria as a result of massive defections to the APC and virtual lack of opposition to the ruling party.

Okorie told the Daily Sun that “Nigeria is too diverse,  too complex and too complicated to degenerate into a one-party state. It is not just possible…anybody dreaming of a one-party state is not reading the political barometer of Nigeria correctly.” He blamed the current opposition paralysis on what he described as a flawed electoral system and a dearth of ideologically based political parties.

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