INEC Begins Verification Of Political Parties, May Reduce Them To Five
The independent National electoral commission (INEC), has commenced a process, that will lead to the reduction of political parties in the country to a maximum of five (5) parties.
The move in conjunction with the National Assembly, is to strengthen the electoral process and reduced the logistic headache being experienced by INEC and its ad-hoc staff during elections in the country.
Nigeria, a multi party state, currently have not less than ninety one political parties, with some of them never won any election since they were established.
Since the return to democratic rule in 1999, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), have been the most dominant party with grassroots structures in all the 774 electoral wards in Nigeria. Recently in 2015, a merger amongst ACN, CPC, APGA and ANPP gave birth to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), who defeated the then ruling PDP from power.
Nigeria, as at today has two dominant political parties, PDP and APC with majority of the candidates rooting to have their tickets under these two parties.
Nigeria’s former military dictator, General Ibrahim Babangida, has always been a promoter of two party system, he claimed that with two party system, the gain of democratic process will be deepened, unlike multi party system, that leaves the system with various degrees of challenges.
In the United States of America, for centuries, President have always been rotated between the republicans and democrats, same as in the United Kingdom where whoever that will emerge as the Prime Minister most times, comes from either Labour or conservatives.
Babangida argued in the past that, Nigeria’s electoral process becomes too cumbersome and expensive with too many parties lietsed on the ballot paper, his argument was supported and holds as some electorate gets easily confused and cast their votes against wrong logo/parties with similarities on the ballot paper.
Prunning down the numbers of political parties ahead of the 2023 elections won’t be an easy task, because the constitution permits freedom of association, which gives power to Nigerians to organize themselves into groups, including political parties. To achieve this, it means that, the National Assembly must first amend the constitution in order not to give room for lacuna in court.
The Inter Party Advisory Council (IPAC), an association of different political parties may not be too happy with this move, as they are likely to challenge the validity in court, in order to protect their members.
There is a plan by some political parties, to come together ahead of the 2023 elections. What is not clear is, whether they want to go in the way of merger or a working relationship like the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) did during the 2019 election.
Although, CUPP arrangement didn’t give much tangible results, order than media sensitization by their spokesperson Ikenga, as many of the parties under this arrangement do not have grassroot structures.
From available sources, the five listed parties includes the PDP, APC, ADP, APGA and Labour Party. Another top members of one of the leading political parties confirmed that, INEC has commenced verification exercise for political parties across the country.
The modality is to verify if they
meet the requirements which includes having National headquarters, National Excos, State offices and excos in at least 2/3 of all the 36 States.
Preliminary investigation suggests that, only a few of the political parties in Nigeria have or will meet INEC requirements, and this may help the electoral body and National Assembly to get the justification to de-register many of them.
The move in conjunction with the National Assembly, is to strengthen the electoral process and reduced the logistic headache being experienced by INEC and its ad-hoc staff during elections in the country.
Nigeria, a multi party state, currently have not less than ninety one political parties, with some of them never won any election since they were established.
Since the return to democratic rule in 1999, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), have been the most dominant party with grassroots structures in all the 774 electoral wards in Nigeria. Recently in 2015, a merger amongst ACN, CPC, APGA and ANPP gave birth to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), who defeated the then ruling PDP from power.
Nigeria, as at today has two dominant political parties, PDP and APC with majority of the candidates rooting to have their tickets under these two parties.
Nigeria’s former military dictator, General Ibrahim Babangida, has always been a promoter of two party system, he claimed that with two party system, the gain of democratic process will be deepened, unlike multi party system, that leaves the system with various degrees of challenges.
In the United States of America, for centuries, President have always been rotated between the republicans and democrats, same as in the United Kingdom where whoever that will emerge as the Prime Minister most times, comes from either Labour or conservatives.
Babangida argued in the past that, Nigeria’s electoral process becomes too cumbersome and expensive with too many parties lietsed on the ballot paper, his argument was supported and holds as some electorate gets easily confused and cast their votes against wrong logo/parties with similarities on the ballot paper.
Prunning down the numbers of political parties ahead of the 2023 elections won’t be an easy task, because the constitution permits freedom of association, which gives power to Nigerians to organize themselves into groups, including political parties. To achieve this, it means that, the National Assembly must first amend the constitution in order not to give room for lacuna in court.
The Inter Party Advisory Council (IPAC), an association of different political parties may not be too happy with this move, as they are likely to challenge the validity in court, in order to protect their members.
There is a plan by some political parties, to come together ahead of the 2023 elections. What is not clear is, whether they want to go in the way of merger or a working relationship like the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) did during the 2019 election.
Although, CUPP arrangement didn’t give much tangible results, order than media sensitization by their spokesperson Ikenga, as many of the parties under this arrangement do not have grassroot structures.
From available sources, the five listed parties includes the PDP, APC, ADP, APGA and Labour Party. Another top members of one of the leading political parties confirmed that, INEC has commenced verification exercise for political parties across the country.
The modality is to verify if they
meet the requirements which includes having National headquarters, National Excos, State offices and excos in at least 2/3 of all the 36 States.
Preliminary investigation suggests that, only a few of the political parties in Nigeria have or will meet INEC requirements, and this may help the electoral body and National Assembly to get the justification to de-register many of them.
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