Tackling mercantile political defections in Nigeria

By Tonnie Iredia

The only thing that is not changing in Nigeria is politics. Since independence in 1960, politics in the country has remained dirty. At first, we had local heroes who ‘won’ electionsthrough crude force such as political assassinations as well as the abduction and imprisonment of political opponents before voting day.Although not much of that happens these days, what has changed has been the methods employed for achieving the same goal of fake elections.As a result, it has been difficult to recruitinto government at any level, visionary leaders that canformulate and implement viable public policies for developing our society and improving the welfare of Nigerians. This is why our country has had an unending stunted growth.

Except genuine efforts are made to put a halt to the practice of plantingincapable hands into governmentparticularly at subnational level, each successive government would continue to complicate the challenges it inherited. In other climes that we seek to emulate, many of their leaders show ample regards for principles while Nigerian politicians remain experts in jumping from one political party to another as if our political parties are not made up of persons of likeminds.In fact, Nigerian politicians behave as if democracy is about the ruling political party whereas political opposition is an integral part of democracy. A nation without a viable opposition party is a dictatorship and not a democracy. There is therefore the need for well-meaning Nigerians to assiduously support an end to mercantile political defections in their country.

Only last week, Onyewuchi Ezenwa, a senator representing Imo East defected to the All Progressives , APC, from the platform of the Labour LP through which he won his election. The senator claimed the defection was due to factions in the LP. Not many are persuaded that the disagreements among members of the LP can fully explain the senator’s disposition. Perhaps his claim would have had little weight if he moved when the LP had two contending and acrimonious chairmen – Julius Abure and Lamidi Apapa. Today, the problem in the LP is not about factions that can sharply divide a party into two,but about the same disagreements among stakeholders that are happeningin other parties.

How come there were no defections in the APC where some members grumbled over the election of the national chairman of their party from the North-west instead of the North-central which was the zone that was entitled to completingthe tenure of the immediate past chairman? Would a senator of the Peoples Democratic Party PDPgenuinely defect from the party only because the current acting chairman is not from the appropriate zone?Against this backdrop, some analysts believe that Ezenwa’s defection may not be different from the trend of defections to the ruling party of a state of a defector because of the quantumof material gains likely to flow to a defector.

In neighbouring Abia state,it was probably the same reason that influenced two members of the State House of Assembly–Ihenacho Nwogu and Fine Ahuama to defect from their party, the Young Progressive Party YPP to the ruling Labour party. Well, as Governor Alex Otti of the state is being hailed in several circles for his developmental strides, the inclination to find one’s way into his campcan be far more tempting than other excuses.As for senator Ezenwa, not much was heard of his efforts as the highest leader of the LP in Imo state towardssettling the supposed squabbles within his party before succumbing to defection in protest against the said squabbles.Expectedly, the Imo state chapter of the LP is set to seek his withdrawal from the senate through the courts.

With the recent judgment of the Supreme Court concerning the local government system, it is obvious that the Apex Court has what it takes to tackle the nation’s huge political rascality. Indeed, the judgment elicited several reactions from many people. To the affected local officials, the judgmentespecially the aspect in favour of financial autonomy was a source of joy as they hitherto had no control over funds for developing their local constituencies. Although the judgment virtually amended the constitutional provision for the existence of a joint local/state government account, many analysts still hailed the judgment because everyone had become tired of the excessive control of local officials by state governors. Many persons were similarly satisfied with the Court’s nullification of the use of caretaker teamsinstead of democratically elected officials to run the councils.

The Supreme Court has thus showed that the best solution to Nigeria’s political problems is to focus more on the spirit rather than the letters of the law. Unlike other countries which rely on the federal system of governmentthat has two tiers, Nigeria deliberately designed a third tier to put a halt to its special situation in which rural communitiesare abandoned by state officials who always concentrate on urban centres especially state capitals. To give financial autonomy to local governments is therefore a positive approachof using the intendment of the law toensure more development in rural areas. Again, to make sure that Nigeria remains a true democracy, it is salutary to stop governors fromstarving local communities of democratic norms and structures.

Our Supreme Court can no doubt further assist Nigeria’s growth if it also tackles mercantile political defections which have refused to abate. This it can do by ignoring technicalities that defectors have over the years employed to sustain their movements. Considering that votes cast in an election belong to both a candidate and his party, no candidate should be allowed to transfer the votes of his party to another simply because he personally desires to change his political affiliation.In the case of the legislature, lawmakers should be dissuaded from trumpeting certain disagreements among party members into a justification for defectingfrom one party to another. The claim that everyone is entitled to freedom of association really concerns those who are holding no office which they attained through electoral votes.

It would be recalled that during President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration, Governors Ben Ayade and Dave Umahi of Cross River and Ebonyi states respectively absconded from the PDP into the APC. The judiciary refused to remove them from office on the ground that defection was not one of the conditions for removing a governor from office. To some people that decision looked only at the letters of the law; it ignored the fact that the governorswere not the sole owners of the votes that brought them to office.Our view then which we still hold today is that the governors should have been told that while they have freedom of movement and association, they couldn’t move with votes which the law recognizes to belong to the party they were defecting from. That approach would have curtailed the propensity for politicians to exploit the nation’s political system.

There are many other areas of politics that the judiciary can positively interrogate to save Nigeria. One of them is the issue of internal democracy in which political leaders often display crass irresponsibility.Why should a party work against some of its own members? A party which presents a non-contestant as its candidate to INEC for general election while slide-lining the true winner of the primary election is unduly reckless because what the party is suggesting is that party primaries are voluntary. If so, why provide for primary elections? A court which similarly hides under the claim that it is an internal matter of the party is inadvertently supporting the recklessness of political parties. If not, why is INEC mandated to monitor party primaries?

In today’s Nigeria,there is tension everywhere because some activists are reportedly planning to hold nationwide protests against what they call bad governance. Whereas it is unfair to hold only the current one-year old administration liable for it, bad governance will never end if politicians are not called to order. Over the years Nigerian politicians have never listened to our cries that politics and governance are not the same and that politics all the time is responsible for bad governance. Even palliatives meant for us allare diverted by the ruling party to only their members. It is thus unfortunate that Nigerian politics has remained on the same page with irritating comedy.