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The on-going primaries of most of the 63 political
parties in the country demonstrate that the behaviour of a significant
part of the political class has not changed much in spite of the
specifications of the 2010 Electoral Act, and the warning from INEC’s
Professor Jega that parties must practice international party democracy
in accordance with the law.

Reports from the primaries indicate that
godfathers are still in control. Delegates are being imposed rather
than elected for congresses. Persons disliked by godfathers have been
summarily prevented from contesting for elections. Many aspirants are
rushing out of the parties and joining new ones over issues of
electoral injustice and lack of internal party democracy.

This is an unfortunate development because
political parties constitute the bedrock of multi-party democracy. The
character of legislative, executive and local government institutions
is largely shaped by the ideological platform, objectives and
recruitment procedures of political parties. Indeed political parties
are the single most important institutions in the democratic process.

Our on-going review of Nigerian political parties
today demonstrates that most of them have no functional offices in
Abuja and around the country and that many of their officials are not
conversant with party principles and platforms. It seems as if party
manifestoes are written by consultants and party officials have not
even read what their consultants have written and cannot talk about the
issues their parties stand for. In addition, party membership is a
vague operational concept characterised by party barons “delivering”
crowds that are bussed in and out to attend party rallies and
conventions.

Some political parties appear to have been
established simply to collect and share financial allocations by INEC
while others seem to have been set up as future alternate platforms for
some top politicians preparing for the possibility that they might lose
the nomination of the current party they prefer and belong to. It is
interesting and worrying that within hours, barons that have been
blocked from a party reappear as candidates in another party.

There is however a number of parties that have a
real, and in some cases, growing presence in the country and are
presenting Nigerians with real issues. The future of our democracy
would depend on such parties developing and winning elections. For this
to happen, Nigerian citizens must develop interest in monitoring the
political parties for a democratic and issues-based approach to
politics.

The 2010 Electoral Act sets out clear directives
for the institutionalization and enforcement of democratic norms in the
functioning of political parties. In line with our constitutional
principles, all political parties shall have ideologies and ideals
informing their programmes and the way and manner they operationalise
the fundamental objectives and directive principles of state policy
enshrined in Chapter 2 of the Constitution.

The policies and issues articulated in party
manifestoes must therefore be sufficiently clear to enable citizens to
distinguish parties from each other. This would enable prospective
party members and voters make informed choices.

In application of the Electoral Act 2010,
political parties must uphold the core principles of internal party
democracy including openness, transparency and inclusiveness in their
operations. Many of them however are not doing so. What this means is
that both INEC as the regulatory body and we as citizens, who in
principle are potential members of the parties, need to query them on
their bad behaviour.

We need to closely monitor and document the
on-going conventions and primaries of political parties to ensure that
they comply with the basic tenets of internal party democracy enshrined
in universal best practices and the Electoral Act. Those that do not
conform should be exposed and Nigerians should be mobilised to vote
against them in the forthcoming elections.

To deepen our democracy, we need to make political
parties sensitive to the fact that Nigerians are watching and reporting
on what they are doing so that they develop the reflex of improving
their behaviour because of scrutiny. Ultimately, Nigerians need
political parties that subscribe to democratic dialogue as the
principal mechanism for operating their affairs. To get there, citizens
need to start boycotting parties that do not conform to best practices.

One of the legacies of the militarisation of
Nigerian society and its impact on the political process is the
organisation of political parties around personalities, tribe or
religion rather than issues. Issues-based politics has virtually
disappeared from our political landscape. Parties that are not in power
have serious difficulties raising funds for their activities. The
ruling party is rich because it has access to state funds through
government contracts and other creative means of funding.

In a sense, some of the parties continue to
misbehave because they do not really believe that the 2011 elections
will be different from those of 2003 and 2007. I believe that they are
profoundly wrong in their assessment. Attahiru Jega and his team are
determined to organise credible elections this year. This means that we
as voters can use our franchise to punish parties that misbehave by
voting against them. Let’s use this opportunity to sanction the bad
guys so that more good guys can be encouraged to enter the political
fray with issues-based programmes that promote democracy and
development.