Intra-Party Conflict and the 2019 General Elections in Nigeria: The Situation in APC, PDP and APGA

By

Professor Godwin Onu, mni

Department of Political Science

Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka

godwinonu2010@gmail.com

Abstract

Political Parties have been the epicenter of democratic participation across the world. Parties aggregate like-minded members that, compared to rivals, retain partially common preferences, interests and beliefs (Aldrich 1995; Aldrich and Bianco 1992). Their mode of operation has been rooted in the struggle for power defined by allocation of resources and opportunities. In the struggle for power and opportunities, tangible and intangible resources are deployed and some anchored in what Joseph called “prebendalism” and an additional new dimension in Nigeria called “god-fatherism” and “one-chance political witches and wizards” which have become phenomenal. Their character is awful, their blood is stained, and their marrow is cancerous. The consequences have been part of the reason deter for inter and intra-party conflicts, coalitions and alliances. The history in Nigeria dates back to 1922 when the first political party was formed. However, this paper attempts a taxonomy of 2019 elections in Nigeria with a view to interrogating how the issues of struggle for power and opportunities using tangible and intangible resource have defined the chemistry of democratic participation within the period under consideration and led to intra-party conflicts. It further looks at the consequences of intra-party politics, the associated fallouts and how they affected party unity and cohesion, electoral outcomes and sustainable democracy. So many theories have been deployed by scholars to analyze this development. These include group theories, rational choice, alliances and coalition, conflict and power theories. In our context, we shall deploy the framework defined by theory of power as advanced by Hans Morgenthau and Harold Laswell to arrive at conclusion, recommendations and implementation strategies. The paper is far from being empirical but relied more on secondary sources and personal observations.

 

 

 

 

Introduction

Democracy, has been globally recognized by civilized nations as a distinctive mode of governance and political participation. As a system of government, it has been shouldered by the rule of law with political parties as operative vehicles. This vehicle has been the pillar for the entrenchment of democratic culture and practice and key to the institutionalization and consolidation of democracy (Fako Johnson Likoti, 2005). According to Likoti, a political party can be construed as a group of people who share a common conception of how and why state power and resources should be organized and utilized. Political parties, unlike other social groups, have organized structural formation. They not only seek to influence government policy, but also to replace the government in power through elections and thereafter control and implement national policies.

As Schattschneider (1942) cited in Daniela Giannetti and Kenneth Benoit (2009) pointed out more than half a century ago, political parties are the key institutions of representative democracy. According to Giannetti and Kenneth Benoit, a tradition of empirical research on party cohesion and unity in different political systems, driven by a concern for the functioning of the basic democratic mechanisms of representation and accountability, dates to early studies by Rose (1964) and Sartori (1976). The Downsian assumptions have provided the basis for the development and testing of a generalized approach to the study of party competition, known as the spatial approach to voting (Daniela Giannetti and Kenneth Benoit, 2009). This approach has been extended from the experience of two-party systems to the study of party competition in multiparty democracies, in which parties almost never govern alone – meaning that electoral competition and coalition formation are inextricably linked. The spatial approach, based on party policy positions, has provided a coherent framework to analyze coalition formation replacing early ‘policy-blind’ models (Laver and Schofield 1998 in Daniela Giannetti and Kenneth Benoit, 2009). The assumption that parties are unitary actors has given way to the study of intra-party politics leading to the analysis not only the impact of intra-party politics on bargaining over government formation, but other important political phenomena such as party switching, splits and fusions (Daniela Giannetti and Kenneth Benoit, 2009). Though Political Parties affect government formation, portfolio allocation and policy-making, Ceron (2010) acknowledged the reasonability of the unitary actor assumption but noted that it is just a fictional representation of real-world politics. According to Ceron, sometimes parties do behave as if they were united, nonetheless they are actually divided into many subgroups. These subgroups, that might have different shapes and attributes, have been identified under the label of party factions. But why do factions exist? Ceron posited that Party’s members are not equal among themselves. They retain non-identical preferences and different perspectives on how party strategy and party platform ought to be. As none of them is able, on its own, to gain control over the party those members who retain the most similar preferences coalesce to gain influence on internal decision-making. Within each group (party) several members cluster together creating rival subgroups (factions) to enhance their stakes.

 Intra-party politics then is characterized by a twofold process: on one hand these subgroups face the incentive to compete against each other to share the private goods (office, policy and electoral payoffs) while at the same time they need to cooperate in order to preserve party unity, which is the public good that allows to gain access to the payoffs.

Intra-Party conflicts that often lead to fictionalization, is not peculiar to Nigeria. In their study that covered almost all world’s regions, from Australia to Brazil, from Mexico to Japan, from Germany to Israel and South Africa including Italy, UK and the United States, it was found out that intra-party fictionalization and consequent conflicts are worldwide phenomenon. (Harmel et al. 1995: 7) cited by Ceron, noted that ‘Factionalism is a fact of life within most political parties. Indeed ‘most parties in the world have wings or tendencies’ It could even be argued that ‘Political parties are driven by the spirit of faction. Consequently, factions are ubiquitous’ (Heller 2008: 2, Chambers 2008: 304) in Ceron, 2011, p.22). Parties, coordinate their members to extract greater payoffs in the parliamentary arena (through log-rolling and coordinated voting behavior) and in the electoral market. They organize and coordinate their members’ behaviour (Giannetti and Laver 2009) structuring individual preferences in order to maximize individual payoffs (Ceron p.13).

Dearlove (2000 in Likoti, 2005) argues that parties recruit people to form their support base and socialize candidates to party ethics so that the party can be seen to work together in a principled fashion. Political parties form the source from which the appointment of people to positions of power on various state levels is affected. Furthermore, they aggregate diverse interests from society. They collect sets of interests in order to produce a common policy. Similarly, while serving their grassroots supporters they also educate them politically. This is done by highlighting social problems to the masses and outlining their approaches as to how they will deal with these problems and thus better the life of citizens. Therefore, in trying to solve these problems through a common political platform, parties aggregate the interests and give weight to them as election issues. The parties ‘sell’ these interests by articulating them to the wider populace as an election programme or manifesto. According Dearlove, they also give wide expression to political and social interests that would have otherwise remained private. For this process they use the media and public gatherings.

Political parties he further stated mobilize people and structure the popular vote by providing a wide menu of choices at elections for voters to support their individual candidates. By mobilizing people to a political issue, they legitimize the election process and stabilize the political order. Conventionally every elected government is first supported by a political party that shape its policies. Parties provide the link between the citizens and the state and thus make representative, responsible and responsive government a reality. They serve the dual function of representation and government (Dearlove 2000).

One of the cardinal pillars of democracy is pluralism and multiparty competition. Political parties in democracies compete for state power through regular elections to further their goals (Vanhanen 1997). While the media depicts parties as disciplined associations, the reality is far different (Crew 1993), as they are formed by people with diverse interests. They often protest or quit if they perceive that their interests have not been met. They are characterized by personal rivalries, ideological divisions and tensions between the leadership and grassroots supporters. In fact, parties are uneasy coalitions (Crew 1993).

Nevertheless, political parties play a salient role in and constitute a vital element of a democracy. In fact, the fundamental purpose of political parties and party system is to provide a stable pattern of expectation, activities and behaviour for the peaceful change of government from one faction of the ruling class to another or from one set of individuals within the ruling class to another (Nnoli 1986, 139)

In most African countries, political parties also play a legitimizing role for the party that won elections held in free and fair conditions. Parties are expected to have a robust democratic culture not based on geographical area, ethnicity or region but representing the nation as a whole.

 In Nigeria, the framers of the 1979 constitution argued that, for the purpose of 1979 elections a political party could only be registered if it satisfy the Federal Electoral Commission that it was not an association confined to a part only of the geographical area of Nigeria; its headquarters had to be in the federal capital and its executive committee had to reflect Nigeria’s Federal character (Tordoff 1997, 120).

Eleazu (1977), wrote that in countries that have partisan approach to conducting political business, political parties provide the means of linking the populace to the decision centers of the political community. Parties also serve as communication channels through which the demands emanating from the environment are effectively articulated to the decision centers and the concept and meaning of national policies are explained to the masses of followers at the local level. He called these, derived functions, contending that the primary function of political parties is to organize and put people into offices to man decision centers so that policies conducive to interests or ideologies they represent will get enacted into laws. According to him, if a political party is in close touch with its environment, if it aggregates demands, if it organizes public opinion, if it communicates demands, it is only because it is seeking a broad base of support to enable it to put and maintain its leadership in power in the political arena. Eleazu argued further that the party system in a country reflects the major cleavages that exist in its political community. We argue here that these cleavages manifest not between political parties but also within parties.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Theoretical considerations

In looking at the whole issue of intra-party conflicts which is later narrowed down to the 2019 elections, one is persuaded to approach the come through the perspective of psycho-analytical theory of power as often used in political analysis and related disciplines. Though the word suffers from conceptual anarchy, especially when one looks at the Friedrichh’s definition of it as “certain kind of human relationship” to Tawney’s emphasis on the identification of power with “capacity of an individual, or group of individuals, to modify the conduct of others in a manner which one desires”. Also, one talks of “some future of apparent good” to Harold Laswell’s view of power as some kind of influence (Johari,1987). There are such other scholars as Marx, Mao Tse-Tung and even Morgenthau.  Johari noted that the concept of power is perhaps the most important of all in the whole discipline of political science in view of the fact that political process is the shaping, distribution and exercise of power. He wrote further that individuals operate the political process of a society within certain arena in which power is sought and persons are brought within the domain of power (p521). He alluded to Laswell’s position and that of Catlin that power deals with relations of men in association and competition, submission and control. Catlin (1927, in Johari, 1987) notes that what men seek in their political negotiations is power. The Sociological dimension of power also puts it even in a more analytical perspective in explaining political behavior. Its appellation in the context of social process as noted by Johari (1987), links it to the what Easton says is securing authoritative allocation of values. This furthermore links it to social power which has to do with the capacity to influence and control others in the language of Pennock and Smith (1964).

Activities of political parties is expected to be colored by instrumental use of control, influence, manipulation and persuasion. At the heart of political process and relevance, is phenomenon of power. Who gets it and what he will use it for? This paper contends that power is not an end itself but means to an end. It is a means to gain access to available scarce resources in the society which includes profitable opportunities. If the constitution says that one must have an elective position and be appointed to positions of authority using the platform provided by political parties, it becomes then natural that members of such party would struggle to influence the outcome of the provisions. They have to exercise power even if it means influence to remain relevant in the political process and have access to resources and opportunities. In the process of struggle for this access, frustration could creep in and that will be followed by some kind of aggression that could dovetail into conflict as witnessed within political parties. The loser in the struggle for relevance could re-group and form alliances and or even coalitions to actualize their ambitions. What causes spits and attendant conflicts could sometimes be beyond politics. They could be economic, sociological or psychological factors coupled with the anarchic nature of concept of power. This is why it is a little difficult for one theoretical model to explicate the intricacies. While power theories can offer dominant explanations, conflict theories, theories of coalitions and alliances and roles theories as well as rational theoretic models could be of immense relevance and informative. For example, there are individual members, strands/groups of members and sections of the political party memberships with varied interests subsumed in those of the political party. Sometimes, it is observed that the interests of groups in political parties become overarching and superimposing to the extent that it turns out party interests regardless of how it touches and influences or even endangers some other members or groups in the same party. The analysis here is further guided by the position of Coser (1956) which overtly recognizes complex interplay of factors, interests and contentions which generate conflicts for strands and the entire system.

 

Party members in Nigeria are guided by their personal and group interests which conflict with those of other members and contradict even those of the political party. These members and groups are thus engaged in relative power struggle over conflicting interests. Of interest is the fact that the party does not aggregate interests effectively in Nigeria. Parties are mere umbrella for strangers whose concerns are those of access to political power, vantage positions, opportunities for themselves and their groups and not necessarily for the political party. This engenders low articulation that creates room for zero-sum situation for members who battle each other for positions and value allocation. Political interests either converged in consensual rapprochements or clashed and diverged in conflicting contests for tickets (Ojeifo, 2018).

We shall be guided in the exploration of intra-party conflicts and 2019 elections in Nigeria by this background.

Brief history of Intra-Party Conflicts in Nigeria

There were no political parties in the real sense of the term until 1922, when the Clifford’s constitution made provision for four elective offices in Nigeria- three for Lagos and one for Calabar. That provision led to the formation of the Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP), led by Herbert Macaulay. The NNDP was later marred by intra-party conflicts. Soon afterwards was the birth of the Nigerian Youth Movement in the thirties. The later soon was bogged down by intra-party conflicts. According to Eleazu (1977), the NYM members also clashed over limited political resources and economic opportunities in Lagos (p137). This was followed by personality clash among its leaders.  This served to weaken the movement and giving way to the emergence of the National Council of Nigeria and Cameroons (NCNC). The intra-party crisis in NCNC let Azikiwe to resign his membership of Western House of Assembly and moved to the East to lead the party. Again, the split in the party led to formation for the United National Independence Party (UNIP), made up mostly of leading members of the minority ethnic groups in the eastern region (p.148). The crisis in NCNC also by extension led to the formation of Calabar-Ogoja-Rivers (COR) State Movement. There was also the crisis that rocked the Western House of Assembly over ideological differences between Chief Awolowo, who was the leader of the Action Group and his deputy and also the Premier of Western Region, Chief S.L. Akintola leading to the request that the later should resign as the deputy leader and Premier. When he refused, the party tried to dismiss him but failed. The attempt to remove him from office led to intra-party conflicts leading also the suspension of the Regional government and declaration of state of emergency and appointment of regional administrator from Lagos (Eleazu 1977, p.161). This led also to the splitting of Action Group and formation of United Peoples Party by Akintola.

At the of military rule in 1979, a new dispensation emerged. The military handed over the affairs of the nation to the civilians following years of agitation by pro-democracy activists.  This development gave birth to new political parties, namely; National Party of Nigeria (NPN), Nigerian People’s Party (NPP), Great Nigerian People’s Party (GNPP), Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), People’s Redemption Party (PRP) (Adekeye, M.A, 2017). Toyden (2002 cited in Adekeye), wrote that political parties in the second republic were a metamorphosis of the first republic that also mirrored the activities the first republic. In this period, intra-party relations were a mixture of cooperation and conflicts. According to him,  while the Northern People’s Congress (NPC) enjoyed some level of internal cohesion, certain elements of conflicts were still evident within the party. An example was when Alhaji Aminu Kano left the party due to the sabotage of his presidential ambition, to form People’s Redemption Party (PRP). Additionally, authoritarian activities loomed in the UPN and GNPP; within the parties, presidential and gubernatorial candidates also doubled as their Party chairmen, thus suffocating the possibility of internal democracy. The resultant effects were defections, fictionalizations and splits. Sunday Afolabi and Akin Omoboriowo of Oyo and Ondo states were also reported to have defected from UPN to NPN, Arthur Nzeribe’s defected from NPP to UPN, Chief Abiola’s defected from NPN. In PRP Aminu Kano and Micheal Imodu parted ways. According to Adekeye, the second republic recorded internal strife, with the UPN having the largest number of intra-party crisis. Then came the third republic which he wrote started with the transition programme. In the General Ibrahim Babangida’s efforts to rid Nigeria party politics of the ethnicization, politics of ownership and party crisis he established two political parties along ideological lines; the Social Democratic Party (SDP) which was a leftist or welfarist party and the National Republican Convention (NRC) which was a capitalist party. Although the party was later dissolved upon cancellation of the highly controversial 1993 election, which marked the beginning of another military dispensation ended in 1999, they no doubt party witnessed their own share of intra-party conflicts within the short time. Intraparty relations in the party were marked by factional feud and in-fighting. The National Redemption Party (NRC) was divided among various factions like the Republican Action Committee by Tom Ikimi, the Republican Solidarity led by Umaru Shinkafi, BamangaTukur and AdamuCiroma and the NRC consultative forum led by Alhaji Ibrahim Mantu. The Social Democratic Party (SDP) was also marked by internal feud and factionalization leading to the emergence of the Yaradua and Kingibe factions.

At the inception of the fourth republic, the main parties: Alliance for Democracy (AD), Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), All Nigerian People’s Party (ANPP) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), have always been said to be largely affected by “deep internal crises, disorder, recurring tensions and turmoil manifested in factional fighting, expulsions and counter expulsions, multiple executives and dual offices (Akubo, 2014: 85)”  The literature reveals the extent to which previous Nigerian republics have been marred by incessant internal strife. Indeed, intra-party crisis is historically deep-seated in the fabric of the country’s party politics, borne out of single-leader control, Godfatherism, Sit-tightism and most importantly, utmost disregard for constitutional structures. Therefore, existing literatures may have revealed the possibility of this sweeping trend creeping into the fourth republic;

Causes of Intra-Party conflicts

Though in one way or the other, we had made know the economic, political and social factors that lead to intra-party conflicts, It reasonable however to be more specific on the same factors that could generate this phenomenon.

Personality rivalry.

One of first factors that is often fingered as the major cause of intra-party conflict is personality rivalry. But talking of personality rivalry as part of Intra-party conflict as believed by Oyediran and Toyin (2016), begs further question as to what leads to rivalry or does rivalry just occur between two strange bird fellow’s unknown to each other or does it have economic or sociological or political explanation.

Godfatherism

Godfatherism has just become phenomenal in the Nigerian Politics. It derives from godfathers which has been severally explained or defined by scholars and politicians in various fora. Ibrahim, J quoted in Albert (2005) defined this category of Nigerians, during an interview granted to the BBC on 10 November, 2003 as 'men who have the power personally to determine who gets nominated and who wins an [an election] in a state'. But godfatherism goes beyond state politics. It is present at national level. Nnamani quoted by Isaac (2005) also defined godfatherism as

an impervious guardian figure who provided the lifeline and direction to the godson, perceived to live a life of total submission, subservience and protection of the oracular personality located in the large, material frame of opulence, affluence and decisiveness, that is, if not ruthless ... strictly, the godfather is simply a self-seeking individual out there to use the government for his own purposes.

 

Albert localized the phenomenon futher tracing its origin to traditional Nigerian Societies, meaning 'maigida' in Hausa, 'baba kekere' in Yoruba, and 'Nnam-Ukwu' or Oga in Igbo (see Albert, 2005 p.9)  and argued that it can lead to intra-party conflicts when the godsons are unable or unwilling to meet with terms of agreement with the godfather. Obviously, the godsons often have their followers that benefit or hope to benefit from his electoral successes and once he succeeds, he starts building his own empire and or at the extreme dynasty. In the process of doing that, the godfather might feel threatened leading to cold war and mutual suspicion. This leads to lack of trust. When there is deficit of trust between the duo, the obvious consequence is conflict. On the other hand, the failure to meet up with such demands of the godfather as juicy appointments, contracts and other opportunities would be perceived as loss of loyalty. The expectation that this might be the case often leads some godfathers to the extent of administering an oat or entering into some kind of covenant with godsons to avoid possible betrayal. The former governor of Lagos State, was refused ticket for a second term ( as alleged) not because he did not perform as governor but he did was not a good party man.

Although this phenomenon has a history and not necessarily of Nigerian origin, it became visible and well pronounced in Nigeria in the politics of Anambra State between 1999 to 2003 following the relationship between Sir Emeka Offor and Governor Chinwoke Mbadinuju. It also resurfaces prominently again following a breach of trust between Chief Chris Uba and Dr. Chris. Ngigie, the then Governor of Anambra State leading to orgy of violence. The entire drama and aftermath adversely affected the fortunes of People Democratic Party in Anambra State and still hunting the party till today. Godfatherism has no exclusive rendezvous in Anambra State, it is also a common feature of politics across the country as the process of struggle for power and access to allocation of authoritative values. A critical observation across some states of the federation during the 2019 elections, reveals  campaign posters and party dresses embossed with photographs or pictures of godfathers and sons. It became an identity symbol and show of relevance to be associated with an established godfather. It was believed that knowing or being close to a particular “Money Bag” or a wealthy politician, is a major way of securing seats during party primaries for selection of candidates. As Albert (2005) noted, the 'political godfathers' in Nigeria build an array of loyalists around them and use their influence, which is often tied to monetary considerations, to manipulate the rest of the society. Political godfathers use their influence to block the participation of others in Nigerian politics. They are political gatekeepers: they dictate who participates in politics and under what conditions. One can even ride on the shoulders of those who are close to godfathers. This scenario played out tremendously during the 2019 elections. In all the cases, when godfathers become frustrated with the activities of the godsons, he will likely put spanner in the wheel of governance and originate crisis that may sweep across the party to realize his ambition. This kind of scenario played out in Lagos state during the 2019 elections between a known godfather and incumbent governor who was accused of being a good governor but not a good party man. The conflicts it generated nearly marred the fortunes of All Progressive Congress (APC), in Lagos before the godson conceded defeat and allowed the godfather to install another godson.

Lack of trust

Another major cause of Intra-party conflict is the issue of lack of trust. Trust is a binding pro-democratic value and glue of social contract and in politics, it is a defining framework for political interaction in as much as it can be synchronized with what Easton (1975) called diffused support. Much of what we do in social and political life are rooted in trust of one another and those of greater others. When there is deficit of trust in political relationships, it affects political outcomes. To a large extent what leads to conflicts at intra-part level is deficit of trust. Deficit of trusting culture can affect political participation, relationship among party members and by extension, economic and political development. Though  Locke (1980), wrote in a wider context of society and state and observed the instrumental nature of trust in maintaining political society and government implying that a government without trust is akin to a knight without his armour, powerless and redundant, this concept can still be downloaded to explain the relationship among political party members as they struggle for power and what power can attract within the umbrella of one party. Lack of trusting culture within a political party is a primary cause of intra-party conflict.  Meer, T.W.G (2017), emphasized integral function of trust to the functioning of democracy, noting that low and declining trust presumably has direct and severe consequences for the quality and stability of representative democracy, its institutions, and its actors. 

Afro-barometer, in a study of 36 Countries between 2013 and 2015, noted the increasing support by Africans for multi-party democracy, however, this support is punctuated by lack of trust in the Political Parties. “Public attitudes in Africa show increasing support for multiparty democracy, but both ruling and opposition parties still struggle to gain popular trust”.  Afrobarometer Executive Director E. Gyimah-Boadi at the Consultative Workshop of the Department of Political Affairs of the African Union Commission’s Political Party Program in Accra made this assertion. He stated further that Political parties are an essential element of a well-functioning democracy, however earning popular trust – and thus greater legitimacy and better prospects for a country’s democratic consolidation – remains a challenge. There is no contestation on the effect of trust on a political system. This is more dominantly the case in a pluralistic society where a party reflects a geo-political spread. Even where it is in tandem with geo-ethnic society, the issue of trust still plays some kind of role in party cohesion, unity and stability. Unfortunately, Nigerian Society and culture appear to a large extent in deficit of level of the trust that could generate unity both at national level down to intra-party scenario. More seriously when even the electoral institution like Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) appear not to be trusted by even party members especially when it comes to resolving intra- party rivalry arising from conduct of primaries. The case of Imo state during the 2019 election is apt.

Lack of Internal Democracy

One of the basic fundamentals of democracy is the principle of transparency and accountability. This raises the question of how accountable the political parties and how transparent are the processes of selection of candidates for elective position. In what ways and to what extent has internal mechanisms of parties helped the members to actualize their ambitions and have their voices reflected in the decision making and their outcomes. The obstacles and frustration experienced by members in this process, is often a source of conflict, splits and re-alignments.  This has also led to defections of members to other political parties where they feel a vent still exists for access and opportunities. According to Edem Beha (2017). If there's a comprehensive process of inclusion of voters and members of political parties in decision-making, initiating ideas, program and party policies, and the selection of party structures, from the local ones to the highest body of the party (Congress or Council), it is assumed that such parties have more internal democracy compared to other parties that are exclusive, centralized and shaped after their leaders. Durverger (1954) and Michels (2001) argued that democratic principles demand that leadership at all levels be elective, that it be frequently renewed, collective in character, weak in authority, though it was cautioned that a Party organized in in this fashion, may not be wearing a good amour for the struggles of politics. But that is what it supposed to be because it serves to weaken the so-called godfathers who wield their powers to handpick candidates for elective offices thereby giving political space for rank and file of the party to make input and become relevant in the selection processes. The process of handpicking loyalists of godfathers by the latter to stand of election on behalf of the parties, and for other offices in the parties is the major cause of internal wrangling and conflict. If not for anything, it serves to frustrate some party members whose ambition are frustrated by godfathers and party Chieftains to look for alternative ways of venting their grievances and achieving their ambitions. This becomes more grievous if such frustrated members are very old members of the parties and have contributed a lot to party progress and sustainability.

In some cases, party chieftains and godfathers, may want to a major “big fish” from an opposition or ruling party just to weaken that party. In doing that, promises of Juicy positions or even elective offices will be made to the detriment of those who have been loyal members for ages. Though some who have nothing to lose by bringing in such people welcome the development, since they believe it will weaken the alternate party and strengthen the party where they are going into. This is often followed with grudges by some loyalists whose opportunities of assuming that position must have been frustrated. So, frustration- aggression theories can explain also the struggle for power and what power can bring. According to, Teorell (199), intra-party democracy is an additional mechanism of general elections, as it establishes deliberative procedures for the exchange of arguments between leaders and members and mitigates intraparty extremism. This lends credence to the views of Susan Scarrow (2005) who defined internal democracy in broad term as a wide range of methods for including party members in intra-party deliberation and decision-making. Some advocates for intra-party democracy argue, on a pragmatic level, that parties using internally democratic procedures are likely to select more capable and appealing leaders, to have more responsive policies, and, as a result, to enjoy greater electoral success. The inability of political parties to practice what they preach and carry on their lips every second is a major cause of problem not just among parties but internally between one party and its members. In many states, political parties surround particular individuals or few of them making it impossible for anyone to be nominated into any position if you do not pass through them or receive their blessing. They impose candidates even when such candidates are not the best for the job. Scarrow, argues that manifestation of these problems are visible on three indicators, namely: selection of party candidates, the selection of party leaders and the definition of policy positions. Lack of inclusiveness, is a primary cause of intra-party conflict. According to Scarrow, Inclusiveness tells us about how wide the circle of party decision makers is. In the most inclusive parties, all party members, or even all-party supporters, are given the opportunity to decide on important issues, such as the choice of party leader or the selection of party candidates. 

Internal party democracy could be likened to the right of all to participate in politics, in the language of Gibson (2013) the “marketplace of ideas” without which internal democracy cannot function effectively. The idea of a marketplace is that anyone can put forth a product—an idea—for political “consumers” to consider. The success of the idea is determined by the level of support freely given in the market. The market encourages deliberation, through which superior ideas are found to be superior, and through which the flaws of bad ideas are exposed for all to see. (almost as if guided by an invisible hand).

 

Differences on how a party should be run.

 There is often some anthropomorphic ‘unitary actor assumption that parties are unitary actors, and focus on them as the unit of analysis (Ceron, 2011). This is not often the case. According to Ceron, Party’s members are not equal among themselves. They retain non-identical preferences and different perspectives on how party strategy and party platform ought to be. As none of them is able, on its own, to gain control over the party those members who retain the most similar preferences coalesce to gain influence on internal decision-making. Within each group (party) several members cluster together creating rival subgroups (factions) to enhance their stakes. This often dovetails to conflicts within the Party and consequent expulsion by major stakeholders.

Rewarding nature of Public office in Nigeria

The do or die battles between and within political parties are often fueled by high stakes for huge rewards of public office and in many states, for control of power and revenues by individuals and between ethnic and religious identity groups (Crisis Watch, 2019). If political offices are not hugely rewarded, the struggle for it may not worth the onion. Such can promote the spirit of give and take and make looser feel that they have not lost much. The venom inputted into the struggle for power will reduce and peace will win.

Political intolerance

Political tolerance could be likened to activities in a political market where every product is allowed to sale and bought. It requires give and take and accommodation of ideas and excesses of traders and buyers. Intolerance appears to be the opposite. However, one major question here is whether intolerance is a cultural trait passed perhaps through socialization or circumstantial and situational? In African context, the situation in the family (the basic political institution) manifests in the wider market of politics. The elder must be obeyed whether he is right or wrong. Disobedience to the elder, means insubordination and part of defining traits of a good child is that he must obey the elder and do whatever he is told to do. The Man is the head of the family. The family members including the wife (s), must obey him at all times. The average African family is to a large extent authoritarian. This authoritarianism often finds its ways in institutions outside the family-in groups, including political parties. This is often the root of political intolerance. Intolerance is a major cause of conflict. It also often forgotten that some elders carry-over childhood and youthful stupidity into adulthood and grow old with it.

This position implies that in every explanation of political party behavior, culture matters. It could be an instrumental tool and framework to explain the attitude of intolerance that occasion intra-party conflict. This provokes further investigation on the role of culture and indeed political culture in intra-party conflicts in Nigeria.

 

Acrimonious contest for party offices;

 Ben Oguntuase in the Cable news of September 14, 2018 noted that contest for party offices have always been acrimonious. The motive behind the mind of politicians during primaries indicates that everyone wants to hold party office in order to be a “delegate” at primary and facilitate a rich harvest from the fat cat aspirants. In anticipation of securing their votes at primary election time, general election aspirants actually sponsor members according to him into those offices during the congresses. Where the party office aspirants of a general INEC election aspirant fail to clinch the ticket, hell is let loose

Intra-party conflicts and 2019 elections

February 2019 was the month for general elections in Nigeria. Prior to this period, calculations were made, expectations were high, forecasts and predictions thrived and even men of God prophesized on who will win. The prophecies were more for the aspirants for the post of office of the President.  On record was and as some published in the media were 91 political parties out of which 69 presented candidates for the office of the president. However, the two front runners were the incumbent president, Mr. Muhammad Buhari of the All Progressive Congress and Mr. Atiku

Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party. The two parties were also the front runners.

However, one basic fact is that the 2019 elections and primaries that led to selection of candidates were characterized by series squabbles and litigations and some are still lingering up to the moment of writing this paper. According to Nigerian 2019 International Election Observation Mission, the absence of internal party democracy and the lack of effective mechanisms for resolving intra-party disputes contributed to highly contentious party primaries in 2018 which resulted in more than 600 pending court cases, some of them to resolve candidacies for state-level offices.

The report noted that “parties and candidates are relying on the court system to resolve problems caused by their own opaque candidate selection processes.” In the lead-up to the gubernatorial elections, court rulings on the eligibility of parties and candidates in several states were issued within days of the polls. It was further stated that last-minute legal proceedings and uncertainty about which parties would be on the ballot created confusion among voters and may have hindered effective campaigning by parties and candidates. These legal wrangling furthermore posed significant challenges in election planning for INEC and overburdened the legal system. Patronage networks at the local level and godfatherism played significant roles in securing mandates to contest elections and these in most cases led to one type of conflict or other. The Group report drew attention to the possibility of intra-party politics leading to or aggravating ethnic and religious tension in some parts of the country. The crisis was more prominent with APC. From crisis of confidence that characterized the National Working Committee to personality clashes, wounds created by the emergence of leadership of the National Assembly, frosty relationships between the executive and legislature and demolition of properties of splinter groups marred the party primaries.

The elections reflected strong similarities between the APC and PDP as major political parties in Nigeria. Virtually indistinguishable in terms of their ideologies, policies and conduct, both political parties functioned as patronage-fueled coalitions of fractious elite networks that share one objective: achieving political power and the financial rewards that come with it (Page and Tayo, 2018)

The March 9, gubernatorial races were held in 29 states while the state House of Assembly elections were held in all 36 states. Seven states held their gubernatorial polls off-cycle (Nigerian 2019 International Election Observation Mission).

For the purpose of this paper, it may not be possible to diagnose intra-party conflicts and their causes in all the political parties and states of the federation. Perhaps a commissioned research may do that. We shall be constrained because of time and space to look at the intra-party conflicts as was the case with the two political party forerunners, namely the All Progressive Congress and Peoples Democratic Party. We shall also take examples from few states of the federation to drive home our position on this matter as it relates to few other parties.

In Rivers state, the root of the conflicts was formally between two actors from two different parties. The incumbent Governor and his predecessor who served from 2007 to 2015. This rivalry and power of incumbency notwithstanding, the internal conflicts in the APC was more of its undoing. The struggle for power and anticipated control of state resources if election was won with the latter fueled internal power struggle. This was manifested by the APC primaries and the controversial processes of selection of candidates for elective offices.

In the same State, there were four aspirants for the office governor under the platform of APC. The inability of the party to resolve its internal contradictions led to break up of the party into two factions. A faction of the party loyal to Magnus Abe, senator representing Rivers south-east, adopted direct primary election while the faction loyal to Rotimi Amaechi, minister of transportation, went for indirect primaries.

Abe’s faction produced him as the governorship candidate while the Amaechi-led faction produced Tonye Cole, former executive director of Sahara Group. The groups lost out in the court following the Court’s judgement declaring the candidates as products of illegitimacy. The consequence was that APC could not field any candidate for the 2019 primary election. This situation was to the advantage of the PDP as the latter, had a field day and eventually won the election.

In Akwa-Ibom State, the split between the PDP Governor Udom Emmanuel and his predecessor Godswill Akpabio as well as the struggle to control the state House of Assembly, was a major cause of crack within the party. According to Crisis Group, some attributed it to the rivalry and conflict to Emmanuel’s alleged reluctance to complete some projects started by Akpabio while others alleged a dispute over control of resources and state machinery. The fall-out of this major conflict was the defection of Akpabio to the APC on the 8^th of August 2018. His support was now switched to Nsima Ekere who later emerged as APC’s gubernatorial candidate. In doing that Akpabio defected with two members of house of Assembly, namely Idongesit Iten and Gabriel Toby. Three other lawmakers also defected to APC according to the report. According to Crisis Group reports, the PDP dominated House of Assembly responded by declaring the defectors’ s seat vacant and these led to litigations and consequent announcement of sack of the Speaker by the defectors. There was also an attempt by the defectors to instigate the impeachment of the Governor. The PDP accused APC of instigating the crisis in PDP as alibi to federal government to declare a state of emergency in Akwa Ibom.

According the Crisis Group, Kaduna state has a long history of lethal ethnic tensions. Post-election violence the claimed about 500 of the over 800 killed across twelves states as result of communal strife and political feuding. The 2019 election featured the incumbent Governor, Nair Ahmad el-Rufai of APC and Isa Ashiru of the PDP. Again, allegations are rife that key members of APC felt alienated and even ostracized and out schemed in process of governance. This led to a split and conflicts in the party resulting into factions. Those in the eye of the storm were three senators from the state, two who later defected to other parties.  Suleiman Hunkuyi defected to PDP while Shehu Sani went to People’s Redemption Party (Crisis Group, 2019). This is in addition to Governor’s choice of Muslim- Muslim Ticket. This meant that he chose a female Muslin as the Deputy Governor from Southern Kaduna, an area that was dominantly Christians. 

Kano State has an estimated 11 million people and is the second most populous state in Nigeria after Lagos. The major intra-party conflict in Kano was witnessed between Rabiu Musa Kwakwaso and his former Deputy and successor Gunduje. The speculated cause of the conflict was over the control of state apparatus. While Kwankwaso wanted to still be informally in charge, resistance came from the Ganduje. According the Crisis Group report, the squabble intensified, for some time which resulted in several clashes between supporters of the two groups known as Kwankwasiyya nd the Gandujiyya. According to the Group, Kwankwaso was based in Abuja and was unable to hold meetings and rallies during the campaign period in Kano. Even the Police claimed that they could not guarantee his safety to hold rallies especially when the Commissioner for Special Duties was alleged to have incited their supporters to stone Kwankwaso if they ever see him in Kano. Because of this development, Kwankwaso with his supporters defected to the PDP making the conflict more severe and razor sharp. He now threw his weight behind the PDP governorship candidate, Abba Kabiru Yusuf.

Ekiti crisis was allegedly ignited by the decision of Ayodele Fayose to pick his deputy, Prof. Kolapo Olusola singlehandedly as his successor and the candidate of the party in the governorship election. He was given a fight of his life by some aggrieved members of the party. The personality clash between the National leader of APC and the former national chairman of APC John Odigie Oyegun was also a major intra-party issue. The former Chairman was accused of fulling the crisis in some chapters by not taking appropriate actions especially in Kogi and Kaduna States and his hastily decision to inaugurate a parallel state executive Committee for Kogi and indifference to leadership tussle in Kaduna, that ignited conflicts of violence was some of the off-shoots of internal squabble. The one story building believed to be the property of Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi (Kaduna-North) was pulled down allegedly on the orders of the governor by the State Urban Planning and Development Agency.

In Benue state, the attempt by 30 members of the state House of Assembly to impeach Governor Samuel Ortom, went to Court. The governor defected to the PDP on the grounds that he can no longer condone the killing of his people by Fulani herdsmen, the biggest problem he has had to deal with as Governor of Benue State.

It was alleged that powerful Abuja-based political adversaries like the former Governor of the state, Senator George Akume and others want him out of office and according to Abati, he was caught between a moral dilemma and the reality of political survival created by political herdsmen.

Though the Electoral Act of 2010 (as amended), stipulates in Section 87 that the procedure for the nomination of candidates by political parties for various elective positions could be by a direct or indirect process. While the PDP opted for the direct method, the APC adopted the two (Toromade, S. 2018). The indirect method is often subject to manipulation and rigging. This created problems or APC.

By every barometer, intra-party conflicts were witnessed more in the APC than other political parties. This led to mass defections to other parties. 16 Senators, including President of the Senate, 3 Governors, 37 members of the House of Representatives, the Nigerian Ambassador to South Africa and the National Publicity Secretary of APC all defected to other parties. PDP was the major beneficiary of this development. When APC raised an alarm and called on the Senate President to vacate office, Section 50(1) of the Constitution was used to back up his continued stay as the Senate President.  (a) “wherein it is stated that there shall be “a President and Deputy President of the Senate, who shall be elected by the members of the House from among themselves”. The same applied to the House of Representatives in section 50 (1) (b). The implication of this provision is that these principal officers must not come from the ruling or majority party. The only way they can be removed from office is stated by section 50) (2) (c). This section states that they can only removed from office by the votes of not less than two-thirds majority of the members of that house. These defections were major fall-outs of intra-conflicts and huge embarrassment to the ruling APC government. They were also resulting of power struggle and what power could bring.

According Ruben Abati,

I think Comrade Oshimomhole also needs to be reminded that Nigeria is not running a parliamentary system: the agenda of the party supremacy that he has been pushing, and which probably makes him sound like a cane-welding party chairman-dishing out Stalin-like instruction to other party members in only bound to alienate others and effectively turn into an undertaker. A Constitutional democracy such as we run requires greater inclusion, horse-trading and statesmanship rather than the dominant rhetoric of arrogance.

Defections are signs of conflicts and divisions in a political party. Section 68 (1) (g) permits defections from one political party to the other in the event of a division in the political party of which a person is a member, or merger of two or more Political parties or factions. It was evident that there was a division in the ruling party-APC. While Adams Oshiomhole led one faction, Engr. Buba Galadima led the other faction known as the Reformed APC and Saraki faction that joined the PDP. While defecting, Engr. Galadima complained of failure of leadership within the party. Governor Tambuwal cited corruption, mismanagement of the economy and spread of national insecurity and what he called “prison-yard democracy and his reasons for defection Abati, (2018). He was angry with the manner in which APC Chairman has been chewing his fingers and feet and uttering drivel, arguing that this has been part of the problem with the APC. His drivel alone according to him is enough to sink the APC ship. For APC National Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi and Former Senate President, Olusola Saraki:

The former APC National Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi also issues a statement dripping with venom and contempt for a political party, which he had defended only a week earlier. Saraki’s anger is perhaps on the face of it, understandable-here was a man who from day one was not given any respite by the Buhari Presidency, here was a man who was criminalized by the same party he helped to build; he had to saved by the Supreme Court of Nigeria, only to be labeled “an armed robber” subsequently. Like Saul on the way to Damascus, Saraki and other have now seen the light; like the biblical prodigal son, they are all returning to the PDP, which Dina Melaye calls their “home”

He however branded the politicians as “Political Normads” who can belong to PDP in the morning and APC in evening or any other party and justify their nomadism with very strong arguments. He argued that the political parties are not build on any concrete principles or ideology instead they are vehicle for political survival and access to power by ambitious politicians.

Another problem that fueled complaints was the exorbitant fees charged for expression of interest and consequent nomination to run for election. According to European Union Observer Mission report 2019, “to run the primary of the two political parties costs up to N45 million Naira”. The report noted further that the procedure for the selection process lacked transparency and winners were subsequently changed at will by party leaderships. The parties it stated further had no objective criteria for screening candidates.

In Zamfara Premium Time of May 4, 2019 reported that prior to the general election, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said it would not allow the APC field candidates in Zamfara because the party did not hold primaries within the stipulated time.

The controversy among leaders of the party in the state led to the inability to hold the primaries within the stipulated time.

While Governor Abdulaziz Yari’s faction claimed they held congresses and produced candidates, Senator Kabiru Marafa’s faction maintained that no primary held.

In fact, the national leadership of the party under the watch of Adams Oshiomhole according to the report admitted that no primaries were held but claimed consensus candidates were adopted within the stipulated time. This development gave opportunity to the opposition PDP candidates to occupy all the seats from state to national level and Imo states, the political interest of the governors, clashed with those of the party at the center there robbing of chances retain the governorship seats in the states. The case of Rivers state has been noted earlier. Mr Okorocha had a running battle with Mr Oshiomhole over the refusal of the party to recognize the governor’s son-in-law, Uche Nwosu, as its governorship candidate in the state. The party also dissolved the state working committee loyal to the governor. Mr Nwosu later defected to another the Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) but was not fortunate enough to win the election. The PDP won the election in the state.

From state-based parties to national, APGA in Anambra state felt a debilitating blow of candidate imposition and injustice to members at the national assembly elections. In fact, if not the result of the presidential elections that saw the inability of the PDP to secure the presidency, APGA would have collapsed in Anambra state. Against known precedents, the party won only 4 out of the 11 federal constituencies and none of the 3 senatorial seats in the state. The situation allegedly occasioned massive disbursement of funds to electoral wards and local governments on March 9 in a bid by the governor to ensure stability in the state assembly. At the end of the day, APGA won 26 out of 30 seats in the state assembly at the mercy of funds disbursed to candidates by the state. The immediate repercussion of imposition of candidates and irregularities in APGA primary elections in the state was the drummed-up impeachment of the state assembly speaker, Rt. Hon. Rita Mmaduagwu by a team of legislators who were denied return tickets to the house led by Hon. Ikem Uzoezie (Obeta, 2018).

On the scale of balance, Thus, the PDP was more inflicted with incumbency advantage than intra-party conflicts. APC suffered more debilitating injury arising from intra-party conflicts and at the state level APGA had its own dose.

Consequences of Intra-party conflict

Bad politics, and conflicts results to bad economics and according to Abati, crisis of growth and progress. Since trust is a key indicator in the investment process, lack of it resulting from conflicts affects both domestic and international investors’ confidence. It increases citizens frustration and rising cost of citizenship. It spices criminality and life becomes brutish, short and miserable, all dovetailing to a value of uncertainty in social, political and economic terms.

The consequent conflicts and heat generated in these struggles to large extent undermined party successes in elections.

Intra-party conflicts  can undermine the capacity of political parties to perform their key role of fostering democratic governance and ensuring that they are responsive to societal needs. Inability of political parties to perform this role would mean that ―the whole democratic experiment can disintegrate‖ (Kellman 2004: 14–15)

Summary and Conclusion

In this paper, we have attempted to look at intra-party conflicts and 2019 elections in Nigeria through psycho-analytic theory of power and other theoretical perspectives. In the process, we took a brief view of history of intra-party conflicts from 1922 when the first political party was formed. We looked at the primary causes of intra-party conflicts and picked some states of the federation and attempted to examine how intra-party conflicts affected their fortunes during the 2019 election. We then extracted the consequences these conflicts could have on the overall polity and economy.

The following factors as identified by Jude &Ika (2013) summarizes our findings. These include :lack of internal democracy, god-fatherism, imposition of candidates, non-compliance of members to the party‘s constitution, injustice and oppression within the party, power or leadership tussle between or among members of political party, conflict of interests between or among members of party, desperation for materialism/ aggrandizement, interference of the political leadership of the executive arm of government in the affairs of political party, bad leadership of political parties, non-inclusion of members in the affairs of political parties, concealment of vital information to party members and corruption among leaders of political parties

Our conclusion is that the conflicts which arose in the parties ignited a lot of interest among citizens. If the impact is measured empirically, it will be possible to conclude that it generated lack of trust among the citizens, between citizens and politicians and lack of faith in the polity, economy and justice system. It also portrayed a gloomy picture of politics generally and how quest for power and what power could bring would lead loss of faith in the future of the polity. It shows among other things the extent politicians can go in quest for power and opportunities. The rate at which courts were delivering Judgements, injunctions and counter leaves much to be desired and difficult for the poor to obtain justice. Engaging a Senior Advocate of Nigeria for one case costs average of Ten million Naira which a poor citizen cannot afford. To that extent, he is denied justice. The militarization of the political process created fears of unquantifiable dimension that discouraged political participation.

Recommendations

A major recommendation for all the parties is the adoption of open and direct primaries for selection of candidates for elective office.  This will reduce the influence of godfathers in the selection process. It will also guarantee internal party democracy and give every member of the party opportunity to seek for elective office and possibly be elected.

Indirect primaries, is frost with manipulation, lack of transparency and promotes godfatherism. It also promotes vote buying and opportunities for elective office going to the highest bidder. It does not give room to members with great ideas of governance who do not have money to surface and make inputs into the process of governance. We in this paper discourage indirect primaries because it destroys trust in the selection process.

The overbearing weight of Central Working Committee of the parties leaves a lot to gape about. This has to be discouraged since it leads to imposition of candidates and creates divisions within parties. These problems could be resolved if primaries are open and everyone has a role to place in the process, since this will promote political inclusion.

Our Judiciary has a major role to place in entrenching a sustainable democratic process. One injunction at Abuja and another in Lagos on the same matter, drags the integrity of the Judiciary to the muds and the consequence is lack of trust in the judicial system.

The Police and Army should completely be out of politics and play purely non-aligned role in the electoral process and be purely professional in the discharge of their duties. This will serve to retain public confidence in the executive arm of government.

We also recommend the restricting of the Legislature, the Executive and Judiciary and make such positions less attractive. The process of becoming a law maker should be made cheap and allowances not more that salary of civil servants and in line with qualifications of such law maker. Those who are better educated and more qualified should get higher allowance than those who are less educated. Such restructuring should also be extended to the office of executive branch. A minimum education standard should serve as a bench mark for the office of Head of State or governor or Local Government Chairman. Minimally, a first degree will serve. This will bring sanity, intelligence and credibility into the governance and electoral process.

There is need for investigation through a round table on the place of culture on sustainable democracy.

It also recommended that Federal Government should make a law reducing the amount of money paid for expression of interest among the political parties. This make it easier for those with lower income to take a shot at elective offices.

The new media should be given access for open assessment of party performance but should be regulated

Implementation Strategies

(a)  The federal government of Nigeria should commence a process of restructuring of the Executive, the Legislature and Judiciary.

(b) Restructuring of the entire security architecture of the Country to give the Police and Army greater independence and free space for professionalism.

(c)  To have another closer look into the entire electoral system with a view to overhauling it to give the Independence Electoral Commission full authority as an unbiased umpire in the electoral process.

(d) Political parties should use open direct primaries or option A4 in the selection of candidates for elective offices.

(e)  The idea of party supremacy, though may serve to instill some discipline among the party members, but the big question as to whether such input into party constitution serves the interest of the party and the general public needs proper and more indebt examination and analysis.

(f)  The legislature to enact a law reducing the fee for expression of interest for elective positions among the political parties.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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