2023: Why Nigerians Should Reject Political Parties And Embrace Individual Candidates -By Mohammed Aliyu Baba

A political party, according to Collins English Dictionary, is said to be an organized group of individuals/people/bodies who seek or intend to capture political power through an election in order to run the affairs of a country.

Basically, a political party brings people of like minds who share the same political ideologies into a platform to harmonize their political thoughts and actions in order to gain the supremacy and control of their sovereign nation. This can best be achieved in countries like Nigeria that operate more than one party system; that’s, either two or multi-party systems.

A renowned Nigerian nationalist, Herbert Macaulay was reportedly the first founder of a political party in Nigeria. He formed the Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP) in 1923. Afterwards, this paved the way for the creation of other political parties, especially after the Independence in 1960.

Nigeria dived into multi-party system of government right from the first republic between 1960 and 1966…, and till date, the country is swimming in multi-party system having about eighteen (18) political parties registered by Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) before the 2019 general elections. Even though many lose ground to two major parties (PDP and APC) in the last 23 years of full democratic dispensations. Notwithstanding, other minority parties also exist and operate as ordinary oppositions to the major/strong parties.

However, the pertinent question here is: How has a multi-party system or two dominant parties helped Nigeria to grow politically and economically? Because it is a dream of every independent nation to move from grass to grace; where political and economic servitudes are fully liberated.

Sadly, Nigeria through her series of administrations since 1960 is yet to witness an holistic overhaul growth or steady development in the economic and political aspects of this giant African Country. Despite the uninterrupted democratic governments that give the citizens every right to elect credible and venerable leaders at certain intervals through political parties, the country is graduating from bad to worse. There is no reasonable development that could significantly impact the lives of the Nigerian populace, especially the common man.

It has been a journey of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer because of corrupt practices perpetrated by those entrusted with the public treasury. Nothing works in favor of the riff-raff due to the high cost of living in the country. The economy is dwindling, inflation is biting harder, insecurity is escalating, corruption is gaining ground, while the common man swims in all the negative consequences of the ill-governance in the country. Worst still, is the gradual killing of the future of the youth through incessant strikes by the teachers of tertiary institutions as a result of the zero attention given to the Education sector. These bad records and misrulings, are traits of both PDP and APC that have been ruling the country since 1999.

For instance, APC climbed down on PDP in 2013 after it said the government had no much funds to handle educational problems properly when ASUU was on strike. The (then) opposition party (APC) was supporting ASUU demands and asked the government of the (then) ruling party (PDP) to cut down the cost of governance so that it can be able to fund education properly.

And now, just nine years later, the same APC is failing, and blaming PDP for signing an unrealizable pact with ASUU; saying there is no money to fund education and meet ASUU’s demands. And you know why? This is simply because the APC of today is housing the same elements of PDP that said there was no money yesterday (2013) to fund education. The members of political parties are simply a recycling set of human beings who run from one party to another looking for greener pastures. This is why you would see a new ship (party) but old cargos (members)

No wonder, Abdelghaffar Amoka on his Facebook page said, “Nigeria has no political parties but political interest platforms. They align and re-align under any of the most selling platforms, PDP, APC, or any other political party…. to realize their interest.”

The result of the just concluded APC convention has said it all. A man who was the governor of Nasarawa State under the PDP for eight years emerged as the chairman of APC by consensus. Many other key offices of the party are now occupied by the former PDP stalwarts. The good, the bad and the ugly politicians can be found in every political party. As such, this bad governance cannot/should not, however, be attributed to any political party or regime because they have one thing in common; failure. 

It is obvious that the individuals that have so far piloted the affairs of the country at various levels have simply failed because of their individual poor ideologies, corrupt practices, bad implementations of policies and programs, misplacement of priorities and ultimately, absence of true patriotism. This is obtainable in the sixteen years of PDP leadership in the country, and so far, more than seven years of APC administration. 

Despite the fact that the country is blessed with both human and natural resources, the ability to exploit these resources and use them judiciously for the benefit of the citizens, never saw the light of the day. Everything is crumbling, day-in-day-out (mainly) as a result of politicization of the country’s endeavors.

Surprisingly, countries like Saudi Arabia in the Asian continent, Morocco in the African continent who are practicing an absolute monarchy system and have no constitutional rights to change their leaders often like Nigeria, are doing great with their country’s economies. Even though the western world would ascribe the system to be undemocratic, uncivilized and authoritarian, it works better than democracy that is marred with corruption, selfishness, abuse of trust/office, and uncouth westernization in many African countries.

Trust me, the economic and political liberation of any nation does not solely depend on any political party(ies). It significantly depends on the individual(s) or group of people that constitute such parties. Otherwise, Nigeria and Nigerians (today) would not have been regretting the marathon change of political party that occurred during the 2015 general elections.

Hence, the dire need for Nigerians to reject political parties and embrace individual candidates. No party is neither a saint nor an evil, but rather the people that made up the party. This is why as a politician, it is either your name spoils your party or your party spoils your name. Because your credibility and that of the party largely depend on the personality of others in the party. And as they said, one yam ‘usually’ spoils the rest. As such, the bad egg(s) in a particular political party invariably spoils the name of the party and that of good individuals in the party.

It is with this that I want to make a Clarion Call to all Nigerians ahead of the 2023 general election, to consider the credibility of individual candidates in any form of political party and give them a chance to drive Nigeria to a Promised Land. In essence, vote for candidates because of their good qualities, their contributions to nation building and human development, and not because of their political parties.

If we should keep casting our votes based on the political parties we belong to, we would keep having those that would destroy the nation as our leaders. This country and its organs have suffered enough and cannot afford to bring on board, those that cannot rejuvenate the economy, create jobs, empower women and youth, fight insecurity to a standstill, fight against corruption or abuse of public office, strengthen the nation’s currency, invest in education and ultimately, improving the standard of living of the citizenry.

May God Continue To Bless Nigeria.

Aliyu Baba Mohammed is a student of  Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.

 He writes from Kaduna, Nigeria.

He can be reached via: aliyu0380@gmail.com