Politics
A Case For Political Order In Nigeria
One thing that has probably seemed odd in the political system of Nigeria is that some things we do are not always thought of as “politics”. There is therefore, some variation in the understanding of politics.
Thus, when we talk about office politics, campus politics, church politics, family, workplace politics and so on, we mean activities that fit into the definition of politics to enhance common decisions for groups of people.
But in the real sense of the word, politics, we often refer only to that kind that has to do with governance in the State. State in this sense refers to a country, such as Nigeria.
Democracy is widely seen as government by the majority, which can be christened “popular power” in accordance with the popular definition by its being “government of the people, for the people and by the people”.
Aristotle, in his “No friend to democracy”, said “democracy exists where the sovereign authority is composed of the poorer classes, not the owners of property”.
Democracy began and reached its peak in ancient Athens. With the decline of Athens, it automatically declined. Athenians held that a life deprived of direct involvement in rulership is without merit, for the citizens involvement in the exercise of sovereignty is the major business of life.
Democracy requires the consent of the governed, formal political equality, inalienable human rights, including the right to political participation, accountability of power to the governed and the rule of law.
This means strict adherence to the principle of equality as well as the rule of law.
The importance of equality is underlined by the tradition of filling offices by lot, the rotation of offices and the adoption of very short tenure to enable as many people as possible to take a turn or participate in holding offices.
Unfortunately, the concept of democracy has been bitterly abused or bastardised in Nigeria to this day. The players know about it but do not give a damn. They are in the least confused about the meaning of democracy and merely address themselves to the idea of popular power which sparks off criticisms and fear among the ruled and opponents.
The practice of democracy in Nigeria has become merely the formation of multiparty for electoral competition rather than adopting the doctrines and theories which are regarded as the classics of liberal democracy.
The founding fathers of Nigeria’s democracy took the momentous historical step of challenging the consensus on the meaning of democracy instead of merely denouncing democracy as being done by the present crop of politicians who use it harmfully.
In Nigeria, democracy has in some degree been reduced to an ideological representation without well internalised realities and serious considerations. There is little or no political order in the Nigerian system. What we have is political disorder.
According to Thomas Hobbes, human nature demands political order, for humans are irresistibly egotistical. For Nigerian politicians, their existence is a continuous striving for the satisfaction of an endless stream of desires, a striving that ends only in death.
The current situation in the leadership of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is putting the country’s democracy in question. The crisis in the party is a crisis in democracy. Democracy is the unifying discourse which is supposed to tame national and international politics to foster peaceful co-existence in a country.
It has been globalised to the point that it is no longer threatening to the political elites around the world, but unfortunately, Nigerian politicians have trivialised it and do not embrace it the way it should be. People no longer enjoy political legitimacy without being subjected to the notorious inconveniences of its practice.
The leadership of the PDP in collaboration with the government should concentrate on improving the economic activities of the country, create employment for the teeming unemployed graduates and skilled youths, and ensure the security of lives and properly of the citizenry while avoiding undue destructive issues that can only bring unnecessary consequences to the people.
Exerting or creating unnecessary authority with unacceptable rules obstruct development and cause division between states and people. We should try to exploit the available riches and opportunities at our disposals to better the situation of the country as well as create a synergy that would promote unity, freedom and peace.
Nigeria’s political problems are largely home-grown and blamed on the rulers. Our rulers rule by corruption, oppression and deceit. Despite Nigeria’s wealth, its citizenry are wallowing in abject poverty and hunger as a result of long neglect, inefficiency and unwise investments by the government.
The country is frighteningly lawless and blatantly corrupt with ethnic divisions and mistrust. Nigeria is seen and known to be playing a positive role in African affairs, and, perhaps, in world affairs too, and putting lots of energy and money into other countries affairs.
The country so dominates the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) that this organisation would have been boneless without Nigeria. It is a member of the AU, Commonwealth, Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) as well as the UN, and is active in a unique sample of international organisation.
Though the country’s political and economic problems are largely home-grown, the colonial past bear some responsibilities, but receding ones. The military era were controlled by rulers without political experience or with minimal experience of governance and precarious authority.
Their authority was personal, derived from charisma or rank, so that the choice for the people, so far as they had a choice, lay between the demagogue and the general. Some were good, some were bad, but all lacked systematic political backing.
They were obliged, therefore, to rely on their wits or swords. The natural outcome of any regime without focus becomes either an entrenched tyranny or constant shifts and instability while freedoms are curtailed or abused on the plea that the autocrat or the one party state would be more efficient.
But such regimes failed to deliver the goods. Industrial and commercial failure became the order of the day-roads and educational institutions decayed, and the health system deteriorated, with corruption at all levels and sectors thriving.
The instability of the Nigerian State and its disappointing performance are due to the kind of leader who power poverty, corruption and crime in swollen proportions. They indulge in u-conceived and ill-managed economic policies which produce crippling external debts.
This is against the principles of a strong economy, which is the prime element in political power and in the public glare, while economic weakness and inequality promote disorders.
The political independence and sovereignty of Nigeria had not been able to assuage the height of poverty plaguing the citizenry and remove dependence on other counties. The country’s trading system among other trading nations still suffers some barriers in tariffs and quotas as the economy weakens day by day, despite the fact that Nigeria has entered the international economy.
Worse still, the country’s economic ties with other nations are not properly protected due to the corrupt tendencies of our leaders.
Nigerian manufacturers are ill-equipped for international economic competition and they produce inelastic goods for which demand (except in the case of oil is less than world standards. The effects of economic recession is clearly marked on the faces of majority of the nation’s populace and there is desperate poverty, in some areas famine.
The rich are getting richer, while the poor soar in abject poverty. Governments at all levels have talked for decades about poverty eradication without implementing the policies.
The time is, therefore ripe for new measures to be devised principally
Shedie Okpara
Justice Peter Lifu of the Federal High Court in Abuja on Monday brushed aside the order of the Court of Appeal in Abuja which ordered him to stay proceedings in a suit that sought deregistration of the African Democratic Party (ADC), Accord Party and three others.
The Court of Appeal in a unanimous decision of a panel of three Justices had on May 22, 2026 directed the Federal High Court Judge not to proceed with the suit until an appeal pending before them and filed by Accord Party is resolved.
In a Certified True Copy Enrol Order of the Superior Court, Justices Mohammed Danjuma, Adebukola Banjoko and Oyejoju Oyewumi asked the lower Court Judge to stay proceedings until all issues on the appeal filed by the Accord Party were resolved
Governor Ademola Adeleke of Osun State had, through the Accord Party, applied to justice Lifu to join him as a defendant in the deregistration legal battle instituted by a group of former legislators.
The contention of the Osun State governor was that he had a stake in the Accord Party, being the platform he was seeking re-election in the August 15 gubernatorial poll in the state.
In his ruling, Justice Lifu on April 27 ruled against the Osun State governor, rejecting his request to be joined in the suit to defend his own position and interest.
Not satisfied with the Federal High Court decision, the Osun State governor, through his lawyer, Musibau Adetunbi (SAN), moved to the Court of Appeal in Abuja where he challenged the Justice Lifu decision to refuse to allow him join the suit.
After listening to the argument canvassed, especially that he has interest to protect as Accord Party gubernatorial candidate for Osun State governorship election, the three Justices of the Court of Appeal, unanimously directed Justice Lifu to allow them look into the grievances of the governor.
In specific terms, the Court of Appeal Justices directed Justice Lifu not to proceed further with the matter and fixed October 27 to determine the interlocutory appeal of the appellant.
However, when the certified enroll order and notice of appeal were served on Justice Peter Lifu by Mr Adetunbi (SAN), the judge rejected it on the ground that it was a ploy to arrest his judgment in the matter.
Although the judge had adjourned his judgment delivery in the matter indefinitely, he finally made a dramatic turn around on Monday and proceeded to deliver the judgment that has now proscribed the five political parties.
Actor turned politician, Mr Kenneth Okonkwo, has rejected the choice of former Rivers State Governor, Mr Rotimi Amaechi, as the running mate to Alhaji Atiku Abubakar in the 2027 presidential election on the platform of the African Democratic Congress (ADC).
In a statement on Monday, Mallam Bolaji Abdulllahi, the National Publicity Secretary of the ADC, announced the party’s choice of Mr Amaechi.
However in a statement, Mr Okonkwo said that the choice of Mr Amaechi from the South South strengthens the continued marginalization of people from the South East.
According to the former spokesperson of the Labour Party, any arrangement that would not factor a person from the South East either as president or vice president in the party is anti-Igbo.
He contended that Chief Raph Nwosu, who founded the ADC in 2005 and willingly surrendered it’s leadership to Senator David Mark did not do so to entrench Igbo marginalization in the party.
The former actor said: “I heard from the social media that ADC has picked its vice presidential candidate from the South-South. If this is true, it is unfortunate, as this will continue the crude marginalisation of the South-East.
“This geo-political zone has neither produced a president or vice president since 1999. To deny the South-East the opportunity to produce the president or vice president in the ADC in 2027, will amount to perpetuating the marginalisation.
“The ADC was founded by Ralphs Nwosu from the South-East in 2005. He made the sacrifice to give up the party in 2025 for the coalition to usher in a better Nigeria. He couldn’t have made that sacrifice to marginalise his own people.
“I did not join the coalition to assist in marginalisation of my own people further. I am of the opinion that if we made a sacrifice to give up the national chairman and the president, it will amount to unpardonable injustice to deny us the vice president in 2027.
“I joined politics to fight for a better Nigeria where no region, geo-political zone, or person will be marginalised.
“The only favour I asked Atiku Abubakar, who openly declared that he is the pathway to the presidency of the South-East, is to show it by choosing someone from the South-East to be his vice.
“If it is confirmed that he has chosen a candidate from the South-South, I wish him well. I am not favourably disposed to campaigning for any presidential ticket that does not have a person of South-East origin as president or vice in 2027”
The National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Professor Nentawe Yilwatda, on Monday said that the numerous projects being executed by President Bola Tinubu across the states in the southeast will give him upper hand over other presidential candidates during next year’s general elections.
Prof. Yilwatda stated this at the Abakaliki Township Stadium during a mega rally organized by the Ebonyi State government and Minister of Works, Senator David Umahi, during which President Tinubu and other APC candidates for the 2027 general elections were adopted.
According to the APC National Chairman, no President had done for the southeast region what President Tinubu has done for them and expressed the confidence that the president would not only win in Ebonyi State but in the entire South East.
Prof. Yilwatda also used the occasion to address growing insinuations in some quarters that Ebonyi State had been conceded to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ahead of the 2027 general elections.
Dismissing the claim, Prof. Yilwatda said the state would not allow the PDP to win any position in the forthcoming general election.
“We will return President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Francis Nwifuru as Governor of Ebonyi State in 2027.
“We want to return all APC senators, members of the House of Representatives and House of Assembly candidates in 2027.
“Nobody has conceded Ebonyi to the PDP. Therefore, there is no vacancy in Ebonyi State. Ebonyi PDP has no place, and there is no vacancy at all in the Government House come 2027,” the APC National Chairman declared.
He commended the people of the state for their support for President Tinubu and urged them to re-elect him in the next presidential election in appreciation of what he has done for the state and the entire South-East through infrastructural transformation and human capital development.
Governor Francis Nwifuru, who also spoke at the event, said the state had no other presidential candidate for the 2027 general elections apart from President Tinubu.
He declared that Ebonyi remained a stronghold of the APC and vowed that the party would deliver the President in the state.
Gov. Nwifuru said President Tinubu had shown exceptional commitment to the state and deserved total support for appointing Senator Umahi as Minister of Works, a role he said Senator Umahi had performed creditably.
“Ebonyi has no other presidential candidate apart from President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and we will return him in the presidential election.
“We are standing here today to tell the whole world, especially those using the President’s name to orchestrate division and confusion in this great state, that we have only one party, and that is the APC.
“This statement became necessary because some people are going around claiming they have discussed with Mr President and that he has handed Ebonyi over to the PDP. They are also saying that Chief Nyesom Wike is their leader and that Wike said the President has given Ebonyi to him.
“Ebonyi is not for sale. We are restraining ourselves because the people are with us. Nobody should push us because we have what it takes to confront anyone trying to destabilise us.
“We want to tell Mr President that he has earned our votes. He gave us what we had never had in Eastern Nigeria — the office of the Minister of Works. And this Minister of Works is not sitting idle; he is working,” he stated.
Senator Umahi, in his remarks, said President Tinubu had done what no other President had done for Ebonyi State and the entire South-East by executing numerous projects across the state and the region.
“Ebonyi State is a one-party state under Governor Francis Ogbonna Nwifuru. We are not going to repeat the mistakes of the past.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has done a lot, not just for Ebonyi State but for the entire South-East and other geopolitical zones,” he said.