Nigeria: The ‘Demise’ Of The Peoples Democratic Party

 By Olu Fasan

Once upon a time, a political party bestrode Nigerian politics like a colossus. It governed Nigeria for 16 years and vowed to rule for 60. But it’s utter hubris. Buffeted from crisis to crisis, a deep rot set in, then an existential decline. Charles Darwin famously said that any organism that cannot adjust to its environment will become extinct. In the struggle for existence, it’s survival of the fittest; only the strong organisms will continue to exist, the weak will succumb to extinction. That’s the story of the Peoples Democratic Party!

In truth, PDP is not dead, not extinct; it’s still alive, albeit on life support. Thus, it’s more appropriate to say that PDP is dying, that it’s on a deathbed. The undertakers and political vultures are circling, and whether the party can survive, whether it can escape extinction, depends on how it handles Nyesom Wike and his gang of renegades. 

John Nnia Nwodo: Orator And Apostle Of Restructuring At 70

 By Oseloka Zikora 

His oratorical skill is his spotlight, which catapults him mostly to dizzying heights sometimes not contemplated. Take Ibadan, for instance, where he was an economics student at the then premier university. He was contesting the students’ union presidency and he had a Yoruba student as the leading opponent. How would he, an “alejo,” that is, a stranger, turn the tables against such formidable opposition?

*Nwodo

 Then came the manifesto night: his opponent spoke first and against the rules of the contest concluded his address in Yoruba, appealing to ethnic sentiments and exhorting the predominantly Yoruba student population to vote one of their own. The chant was “tinwan tinwa o, je ka wole (our own, our own, …ours is ours)” and the atmosphere was charged. To make matters worse, the crowd was dispersing in the accompanying commotion. Somehow, confronted by a Yoruba student and chief campaigner of the disadvantaged “Omoigbo”, the electoral officer asked that the hall be locked, insisted that all candidates must be heard.

Alex Ekwueme Would Have Been 90

By Ejike Anyaduba

Five years ago, almost to this day, the vacuum created by the death of Dr. Alex Ifeanyichukwu Ekwueme in the nation’s political life is yet to be filled. It is hardly to be imagined how low Nigerian democracy has been running, and to what weakness its riders have been reduced through avoidable crises. And it looks like there are no statesmen in the mould of Ekwueme to steer the ship ashore.

*Ekwueme 

Until the military’s convoluted transition to civil rule which ended in fiasco on June 12, 1993, Ekwueme, Nigeria’s Vice President between 1979 and 1983, was almost in the background, never quite in focus. But he would be stirred to action the moment it was clear that the General Sani Abacha’s transition to civil rule was a ruse – a winding path that was leading nowhere.

Can INEC Organise A Credible National Election?

 By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

The electoral landslide of President Shehu Shagari’s National Party of Nigeria (NPN) in 1983 unfolded in instalments over different sites of improbable magic across Nigeria. This did not occur in one day. It involved the manipulation of the entire value chain of election administration over the cycle of four years from 1979 to 1983. It was both willful and methodical.

After squeaking through a very tight field in 1979 with a mere 36% of the votes and not a small helping hand from the judicial arithmetic of the Supreme Court, the NPN in power set about ensuring that they were not left in 1983 to the mercies of any judges. For the party, this meant they had to find a way to wrestle some significant territory off of the hands of Obafemi Awolowo and the UPN in south-west Nigeria. If they did not have living voters, then they had to invent voters by some means.

Bola Ige, The Predictor

By Lekan Alabi

Last Sunday, September 30, this year, marked exactly the 35th year that the first civilian governor of the old Oyo State, (present Oyo and Osun States) the late Chief ’Bola Ige, Senior Advocate of Nigerian (SAN) left office in a rather foggy circumstance.

*Bola Ige 

Foggy in the sense that happenings preceding the gazetted end of his government were fraught with threats, betrayals, back stabbings etc. I intend, by this article, to recall history, but more importantly, to pull the ears of present-day enfant terrible in Nigeria’s political space, that their disturbing acts of incivility, winner – takes – all, anti-party deals, etc., do not advance democracy and good governance.