Six stumbling blocks in 47 years

Several prominent political names missing from the final list of governorship candidates for next year’s elections released by the Independent National Electoral Commission [INEC] at the weekend was likely to be seen by some voters as post-dated election rigging. Never mind that the basis for it was laid in the Electoral Act, ratified by the Supreme Court and enforced by INEC after a “careful study” by its lawyers.

Among the prominent candidates who did not make it into the final list were Gombe PDP’s candidate Ali Ibrahim Pantami, Ogun PDP’s candidate Ladi Adebutu and Nigeria Democratic Congress’ [NDC] Kano State candidate, former deputy governor Aminu Abdussalam Gwarzo. Some other candidates with question marks hanging over their heads following the Supreme Court ruling however made the list, including Rivers APC candidate and former House of Representatives minority leader Kingsley Chinda; Kebbi ADC candidate and former Minister of Justice Abubakar Malami, and Nasarawa SDP candidate and former Police Inspector General Mohamed Adamu.

The stumbling block that tripped them was Sections 77[5], [6], [7] and 84[2] of the Electoral Act 2026, which barred political parties from fielding candidates whose names were not in the membership register that they submitted to INEC within the time it stipulated. Zenith Labour Party [ZLP] had gone to court seeking to annul these sections as having violated the constitutional right of political parties to regulate their own affairs. A High Court rejected ZLP’s argument; the Court of Appeal accepted it and quashed the sections, but on September 26, Supreme Court overturned the Appeal Court’s ruling and restored the validity of the sections. After two weeks’ suspense, INEC published a list excluding some candidates on the strength of the court order.

What was the import of this Electoral Act provision, demanding that parties submit a register of their members to INEC within a certain period before they can conduct their primary elections? On the face of it, it made some sense because INEC is legally mandated to observe party congresses, conventions and elections and to do that, it may need to know who the party’s registered members are. In practical Nigerian political terms however, a party register is unnecessary because apart from party officials and public officers elected or appointed into offices on a party’s platform, no one really belongs to any political party or pays membership dues.

Back in the Second Republic, party membership or, more properly, supporting a political party was well marked and intense. Traders, market women, bus drivers, tenants, tailors and roadside mechanics all identified themselves with political by hanging party flags and symbols all over their premises. Party support in the Second Republic was so strong that landlords threw out tenants, customers avoided some stalls and fathers-in-law snatched their daughters away from husbands all on account of party differences. Even then, there was nothing like a party register of members, but when one wanted to contest an election, he may be asked to produce his party membership card. In a complete departure from the First Republic when people donated coins to finance their parties, from the Second Republic onwards, there is nothing like party membership dues; only persons occupying elected or appointed offices are required to pay dues to their political party.

What then was the reason for smuggling this requirement into the Electoral Act at this time? Many people will say it was an advance APC manoeuvre ahead of the 2027 elections. Party strategists knew that a ruling party’s primary elections are bound to be contentious, with too many people struggling to grab its tickets. Our politicians being what they are, those who lose in the primary elections will allege rigging, manipulations and all sorts of things. Some of the allegations may be true, because governors, ministers and party kingmakers are as desperate to retain control and anoint their chosen candidates as aspirants are determined to grab party tickets.

What then follows is defection; primary election losers jump to other, usually weaker parties where they buy [beg your pardon, win] election tickets and go on to appear on the ballot paper. At one time in the past, we had nearly 100 registered political parties in this country. Most of them were briefcase parties just waiting to harvest defectors from the bigger parties after rancorous primaries. From all indications, APC strategists foresaw this happening, and they used their overwhelming majorities in both chambers of the National Assembly to insert these anti-defection measures into the Electoral Act. It might save APC from the headache of aspirants defecting to other parties and taking along with them large chunks of members. But it portrayed the National Assembly as an advanced rigging machine; stained Supreme Court’s reputation for upholding provisions that at least violate the spirit of the Constitution; of INEC for being seen as a tool in a manoeuvre; and it might encourage many voters to stay at home on election day because their preferred candidates have been excluded from the ballot.

By my count, this is the sixth such legal electoral manoeuvre in Nigeria in five decades. The first one, unfolded in September 1978, was that parties must apply for registration before they can contest elections. The prescribed criteria of “spread” were very stiff. In India for example, small political parties with little spread apply for registration ahead of each election and are assigned a logo to use; the only advantage of bigger political parties is that they have a permanently registered logo. Numerous Nigerian parties applied for registration in 1979 but only five were registered. As we learnt later, Malam Aminu Kano’s PRP did not really meet the spread requirement for registration but the Supreme Military Council decided that not registering it will lead to disenfranchising millions of voters in Kano State, where it had visibly overwhelming support.

The same scenario unfolded during party registration in 1999. Alliance for Democracy [AD] did not meet the spread criteria, but again the military rulers calculated that excluding it could disenfranchise millions of voters in the South West, where it had visibly overwhelming support. While the soldiers were careful with party registration, not so the politicians. In the Second Republic, FEDECO, at the ruling NPN’s behest, refused to register the potent Progressive Peoples Party [PPP], made up of four opposition parties, and instead registered Tunji Braithwaite’s Nigeria Advance Party [NAP], hoping to cut into UPN’s Southwest stronghold. PDP could not however stop INEC from registering APC in 2013, to its eternal regret.

In 1979, came the tax issue. In the heat of the election campaign, FEDECO threatened to disqualify NPP presidential candidate Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and PRP presidential candidate Malam Aminu Kano because they did not pay their personal income tax “as and when due,” as the law demanded. In one Radio Kaduna program, a PRP chieftain said he was the one who went to Malam Aminu Kano and asked for the tax receipts, and that “Malam brought them out, dusted them and gave them to me” to take to FEDECO. The interviewer then said, “Don’t you think Malam made a mistake by dusting them off? You should have taken them to FEDECO with the dust to show that they were old.” Both titans were later cleared to contest.

In 1982, as the 1983 elections loomed, many ministers in President Shehu Shagari’s cabinet were known to be preparing to unseat their state governors. The seven NPN state governors then orchestrated a resolution in the party’s National Executive Committee, that any appointed official who desired to contest for governor must first quit his position. Some did [notably Agriculture Minister Ibrahim Gusau and Internal Affairs Minister Ali Baba] but others quietly gave up the aspiration.

Before the 1983 elections came another manoeuvre orchestrated by the ruling NPN. FEDECO declared that an elected official can only recontest on the same platform in which he was earlier elected. Since neither PRP’s Santsi faction nor GNPP’s Mahmud Waziri faction were recognized by FEDECO, Governors Mohamed Abubakar Rimi of Kano and Abubakar Barde of Gongola resigned from their seats and contested under NPP, unsuccessfully. Just before Governor Muhammadu Goni of Borno resigned however, the courts overturned FEDECO’s order and he recontested under UPN’s platform, but lost to NPN’s candidate Asheikh Jarma.

Then came the 2022 manoeuvre. National Assembly inserted a clause into the Electoral Act barring all appointed officials from participating as delegates at party congresses or standing for elections unless they quit their offices. Many senators wanted to challenge their governors for party tickets, but serving governors had an edge because their commissioners and special advisers were “statutory delegates” at the congresses, which guaranteed bloc votes for the governors. One of the biggest casualties then was Attorney General and Minister of Justice Abubakar Malami, whose ambition to contest for the governorship of Kebbi State under APC was thwarted. He is trying again this time, as an opposition ADC candidate.

And then came this year’s manoeuvre, about party membership lists. The rule may look sensible to lawmakers, the courts and to INEC, but to the ordinary Nigerian voter whose loyalty at election time is more to a particular politician rather than to a political party, disqualifying candidates who defected from the ruling party to other parties is a mortal blow.