Nigeria Content Online

If
a stranger were to go by the reporting in Nigeria’s dailies on the
run-up to next year’s general election, she might just conclude that
the most important issue facing the country is the ethnic origin of the
next president and that the Peoples Democratic Party is the only party
in country able to provide this individual.

She would not be far from the truth. The national
discourse has indeed revolved around the issues of zoning the
presidency and what the constitution of the PDP says about this
obviously important matter.

Various opposition groups and individuals have,
of course, shouted their indignation about this state of things. They
have pointed out that the Nigerian Constitution does not have any
clause that endorses zoning the presidency and that the PDP is not the
only party capable of producing a candidate for this post. They have
even done more, by helpfully analysing the limitations of the PDP,
which include its inability to make a significant positive impact on
the nation despite the fact that it has been in government since the
return of democracy in 1998.

But very few people have paid attention to these
opposition groups mostly because they are not considered a match for
the behemoth they seek to upstage. To all intents and purposes, the
country resembles a one-party state and a lot more needs to be done by
the opposition to show Nigerians they represent viable alternatives to
the party that prides itself as the largest on the African continent.
Clearly size has not meant an ability to govern effectively.

The first two elections (held in 1998 and 2003)
within this fourth republic were relatively competitive, with two other
parties – the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) and the Action Congress
(or its earlier incarnation as Alliance for Democracy) – presenting a
bold challenge to the PDP. Why, they even teamed up to present a joint
presidential candidate to challenge the PDP! By the last election in
2007, the PDP had truly become the only giant in a community of dwarfs
and it hasn’t looked back since. The ANPP has hemorrhaged badly as some
of its state governors – in Bauchi and Zamfara – have defected to the
PDP. The Progressive Peoples Alliance has similarly lost its two state
executives and the situation is not different at the national and state
assemblies.

Since 2007, no fewer than 13 senators and 15
members of the House of Representatives have decamped to the PDP –
reducing the meaning of opposition in the National Assembly to little
more than a joke. Of particular interest was an opposition senator from
Anambra State who spent the better part of three years fighting a legal
battle to reclaim his election victory from a PDP usurper. When he
finally made his way into the Senate, the politician promptly dumped
his party for the one that had tormented him for years.

Defection is part of politics – although in some
countries this is punished as a way of helping politicians to put party
loyalty above personal interest. The PDP controlled National Assembly
has refused to do so, apparently content in the belief that it will
always continue to be a beneficiary of the system. But the opposition
parties are also to blame.

Many of them do not promote any ideology beyond
being anti-PDP. They are disorganised, poorly funded and are usually
beholden to an individual. Their members sometimes do not have much
confidence in their lasting capability. But the future of Nigeria’s
democracy and the development of the country depend on their ability to
survive.

It is to be hoped that a cleaner electoral
process will ensure that the big party cannot easily manoeuvre its
members into political office to the detriment of smaller ones. A more
democratically driven process should also empower real politicians and
professionals to move into the smaller parties and strengthen them
enough to contest for and win elections.

If only they knew it; no party stays in power
forever – as countries from Mexico to Uruguay and Japan have shown. The
electorate is bound to search for viable alternatives. But these would
have to be parties that show a real capacity for governing even if only
slightly better than the ruling party. The future belongs to opposition
politicians, but only those of them who have prepared for it. The time
for making those preparations is about now.