The Role Of Political Parties In Democratic Governance In Nigeria: A Case Study Of Pdp: 1999-2007

The Role Of Political Parties In Democratic Governance In Nigeria: A Case Study Of Pdp: 1999-2007

Chapter One

Preface

Background Of The Study

Popular governance with its ideal of optional representation, freedom of choice of leaders, rule of law, freedom of expression, responsibility etc has come the respectable system of government each over the world. It’s a form of government in which the supreme power of a political community rest on popular sovereignty. According to oyovbaire( 1987) republic as a system of government seeks to realize a generally honored common good through a collaborative inauguration and discussion of policy questions concerning public affairs and which delegat authority to agent to apply the broad opinions made by the people through maturity vote. therefore, in contemporary times, republic has been appertained to as the expression of popular will of the political community through tagged representatives. The contemporary republic according to Raphael( 1976) rest on representative government.

Popular governance in Nigeria has been a different thing when compared to what’s accessible in other part of the world. The respect for mortal right and the rule law which are the main features of republic aren’t visible especially between 1999 and 2007; election apparel and hooliganism is the order of the day that one can hardly separate between popular government and authoritarianism.

In ultramodern societies, political parties are veritably essential to political process. They’ve come veritable instrument or adjunct of republic in any popular system. Political parties aren’t only instrument for landing political power, but they’re also vehicles for the aggregation of interests and ultimate satisfaction of similar interests through the control of government. Obviously political parties are pivotal to the food of popular governance. As Agbaje( 1999) notes that the extent to which political parties aggregate freely, eloquent, represent and organize determines the position of responsibility in public life including access to and use of power as well as political

performance. Merkel( 197799) epitomized the introductory functions of political parties as follows

Reclamation and selection of leadership labor force for government services

Generation of programmes and programs for government

Collaboration and control of governmental organs

Social integration through satisfaction and conciliation of group demands or the provision of common belief system or testament

Social integration of individualities by rallying of support and by socialization

Generally, political parties are veritably essential to popular governance. It constitutes a central instrument of popular governance. It provides the means of promoting responsibility, collaborative action, popular participation, inclusiveness, legality and responsibility through the integration of their contending principles, testaments and pretensions for eventual control of the government in the state. Political parties are the intermediate institution

interceding the affairs of both the people and labor force and agencies that exercise state power.

In Nigeria, the political parties generally are formed along ethnical, artistic, geo political and religious lines. In everyday conditioning of government one notices the fostering of early commitment similar as ethnical sensivity and overt protuberance of other selfish political tendencies as a result, the political class has always remained bereft of feasible political testament on which the nation’s political future could be anchored. The ruin in testament and vision has reduced party politics to a chuck and adulation game where monetization of political process is the bedrock of fidelity and support. This has eroded the end of the popular system.

Since military disentangled from political power in may 1999, the PDP has dominated governance in Nigeria. After eight times of the party in government which earned the respect and admiration of utmost Nigerian electorates at the pates due to its programmes and programs, the party is despised in the country. The average Nigeria encounters frustration, disillusionment and sickie moral disturbance owing to the failure of the Peoples Democratic Party( PDP) government to deliver the anticipated tips of republic. The task of this exploration is to examine the part of the ruling PDP in the popular governance in Nigeria’s fourth democracy between( 1999- 2007).

Statement of Problem

The emergence of popular governance in Nigerian political system in 1999 was a land mark in the political development of Nigeria. After fifteen times of patient absolutism, the return of republic was entered with pump and peagentry by civil societies, labour union, civil rights association etc. Hope was veritably high in the area of mortal right which was fully absent during the absolutism rule.

It was anticipated that the tip of republic would be realized through the political parties which are the means through which the politician reach the public and make their pledges and manifestoes available to the people.

This exploration thus focuses on probing the part of Nigerian political parties in popular governance since 1999- 2007 with emphasis on PDP. The disquisition would be guided by the following exploration questions

1. How does the circumstance leading to the emergence and conformation of political parties ’ impact on internal republic in the party?

2. Did the programmes enhance popular governance in Nigeria between 1999 and 2007?

3. How were these programmes enforced to give good governance to the people of Nigeria?

Objects of The Study

The purpose of the study is to punctuate the part of political parties in popular government with the ruling PDP as a case study( 1999- 2007). The study will critically dissect the issues as follows

1. To examine the circumstance leading to the conformation of political party and its impact on internal republic of the party.

2. To examine the programmes of the party with a view of establishing their applicability to popular governance.

3. To determine whether these programmes and programs were enforced with a view to enhance popular governance.

Significance Of The Study

This work has two aspect of significance originally, it’ll theoretically increase the being body of knowledge in the education on political parties and popular governance in Nigeria.

Secondly, the exploration will virtually be of immense value to political leaders and policy makers in Nigeria and will also enlighten and educate the millions on responsibility of parties in popular governance by so doing; it’ll go a long way in furnishing practical result to some of the problems of political parties in Nigeria popular system. Inversely, the study will serve as a donation to the measures to be taken to enhance sustainable republic in Nigeria. Eventually the study will serve as a provocation for farther inquiry in the area of political parties and governance in Nigeria.

Literature Review

A political party can be define as a group of people or an systematized group of people who seek to control the government in order to put their testament or programme into practice. According to Nwankwo( 1990), political party can be define as an systematized group of individualities seeking to seize power of government in order to enjoy the benefit to be deduced from similar control. He further opines that a political party exists primarily as an electoral machine for gaining power with coherent gospel and its deep ideological end. thus, a political party can be added up as an systematized group of people or individualities whose intentions are to control the outfit of the state if given the occasion to form government. Shively( 1997) sees political party as a group of officers or would be officers who are linked with a sizeable group of citizens into an association; the principal object of this association, is to insure that its officers attain power or are maintained in power.

Joseph( 1979) in his own donation sees political party as a formal association whose tone conscious primary purpose is to place and maintain in public office persons who’ll control alone or in coalition the ministry of government.

Heywood( 2002) is of the view that a political party is a group of people that’s organized for the purpose of winning government power by choices or other means. Heywood points out that four characteristic which generally distinguish parties from other groups are

1. Political parties aim to exercise government power by winning political office( small parties may nonetheless use election more to gain a platform than to win power)

2. Political parties are organized bodies with a formal card carrying class. This distinguishes them from broader and further verbose social movement.

3. Parties generally borrow a broad issue of focus addressing each of the major area of government policy( small parties, still, may have a single issue focus, therefore suggesting interest groups).

4. To varying degrees, parties are united by participated political preferences and a general ideological identity.

5. In simple language, a political party is a group of persons bounded in policy and opinion in support of a general political cause, which basically is the pursuit, prisoner and retention for as long as democratically doable, of government and it services. In other words, political party is a group that seeks to handpick seeker to public office by supplying them with a marker of party identification by which they’re known to the electorate. A political party is thus; at least do three effects to its members and on foxes

1. It’s a marker in the minds of its members and wider public especially the electorate.

2. It’s an association that recruits and crusade for campaigners seeking election and selection into public office.

3. It’s a set of leaders who try to organize and control the legislative and administrative branches of government.

A political party thus, is a group of people and an association like other group or association, except it’s distinguished from any other group by its unique ideal which in a popular settings, is seeking control of government through nominating its campaigners and presenting its programmes for countersign via the electoral process in competition with other parties. Duverger( 1964) emphasized that the general development of parties which tends to diverge from the popular governance and asserts that growing centralization decision timber is decreasingly dwindling the influence of leaders upon members on the one hand and strengthening the influence of leaders upon members on the other. Again Duverger, is of the view that we’re living in completely artificial nation of republic forged by attorneys on the base of eighteenth century philosophical utilitarianism, videlicet; the generality of republic as government of the people; by the people furnishing general happiness for the topmost number. In practice the proposition ceases to live because all government tend to be oligarchic, which shows the domination of the lesser number by a many. thus, republic must reflect liberty for the people and for all section of the people. The author is right in opening up or revealing this obscure aspect of popular parties for analysis, the top ideal of this work isn’t to study the social composition of the parties but their doctrines.

In their donation to the study, sklar and Whitaker( 1963) check the part of Nigerian political parties in political and territorial integration, two crucial logical variables supposed by the editors in the preface. According to them, the exigency of political parties in Nigeria serves as an fresh fractionalization to integrated political system. The emergence of political parties and their leaders appear sectional in the approach to public issues and concinnity since their fidelity inflow in the direction of their ethnical groups and regions. Eventually their fidelity transcends that of the nation and thus, they feel unfit to forge an intertwined political system.

In their own donation to knowledge, Coleman and Rosbergy( 1958) examine the part of political parties in public integration in tropical Africa using the same combination of behaviouralism and structural functionalism as employed by Coleman in his early classes on the background of nationalism in Nigeria. They see the part of political party as necessary in the functioning and the development of the new African society and the political system of which they’re a part. Since Nigeria belong to Africa and has the knowledge that a section of the book contributed by Richard.l. sklar rosbberg’s work is of great significance to us in our presence exploration. The two scholar opinioned that unlike the fairly stabilize public society of the old, more largely advanced countries; there’s an nearly complete institutional vacuum at the central or public position in the new state of tropical Africa.

Agawal et al( 1994). See political party as a voluntary association organized by the persons bound with common interest or end, which seek to acquire or retain power through the election of it seeker into public office. In ultramodern societies, political parties are distinct from other association. They calculate on endless structure and association with define services and places which enhance their rallying of sympathizers. Also they manifest hierarchical order from the grassroots to the loftiest position of government. further strikingly, political parties seek to put their campaigners into public services through election in order to realize the conscious objects, which bond their members. Political parties have come essential to the development of political process. They’ve come veritable instrument of republic. In any popular system, political parties aren’t only instruments for landing political power but they’re also vehicle for the aggregation of interest and eventually the satisfaction of similar interests through the control of government.

Obviously, political parties are pivotal to the food of republic and governance. As Agbaje( 1999) noted that the extent to which political parties aggregate freely, eloquent, represent and organize determines the position of responsibility in public life including access to and use of power as well as political performance.

James( 1983), refocused out that political parties that surfaced during the period of the anti social struggle, unfortunately were formed along ethnical/ ethnical lines i.e., the northern people’s congress( NPC) Hausa/ Fulani, public council of Nigeria and Cameroon( NCNC) eastern and the action group( AG) Yoruba. The author has it that this has been the trend of party politics which latterly formed the background of the emergence of political parties in Nigeria’s alternate democracy. therefore, despite all attempts to establish public parties as opposed to the ethnical/ region parties in the alternate democracy nearly all the parties, NPN, UPN, GNPP and PAP sounded to posses some rudiments of public outlook. This assertion was supported by james ojiako’s publication of the result of the 1979 choices which showed how the people suggested across ethnical lines narrowing down the study to the contemporary trends in party politics in Nigeria and the actions of political parties in the present division, we note that in vibrant popular state, political parties aren’t seen as bare platform for querying choices or political movables rather their function according to MOS Olisa, should include

furnishing political education for their members,

Informing members in government services about public opinion or public issues as well as maintaining as strong ideological base that would insure its survival in the unborn choices.

After the 1999 general choices, there was glamour for further political parties which the president of the independent public commission approved for the 2003 election with the end of furnishing a position playing ground for the parties. Still the end seems to have been defeated but who knows?

In contemporary times, one of the opposition to Abacha’s tone- race was the G18 which transubstantiated into 9- 34 also came the vanguard for the conformation of big visage Nigerian party carried out by the independent public electoral commission( INEC), three political parties met INEC’s condition – the PDP, APP( ANDP) and announcement. Other parties that were unrecorded started to combine with the registered bones . The indigenous right group attributed the failure of the three political parties and the adviser “ unholy ” alliance. This is maybe why all the parties presently feel to be unsettled and pervious. noway the less the PDP commandeered the realm o affairs by winning the maturity of seats in the two civil houses, enwrapping maturity of 36 state governments and producing the chairman of the nation.

In 2003, 27 further political parties were registered there were first registered on 20th June 2002 and they are; all progressive grand alliance( APGA) public popular party( NDP) and united Nigerians people’s party. On 3rd December 2002, fresh twenty four( 24) political parties were registered and they are; all peoples emancipation party( APLP) better Nigeria progressive party( BNPP) community party of Nigeria( CPN), popular alliance( DA), emancipation popular party of Nigeria( LDPN), millions movement of Nigeria( MMN) public action council( NAC), public mass movement of Nigeria( NMMN) public reformation party( NRP), new Nigeria people’s party( NNPP), peoples dictate party( PMP), peoples redemption party( PRP) peoples deliverance party( PSP) progressive action congress( PAC) green party of Nigeria( GPN).

also, on 7th December 2002 fresh two parties were registered videlicet; African belle epoque party( ARP) and united Democratic Party( UDP). This number came to be because of the challenge of INEC to the court by Gani Fawebimi and leaders of some unrecorded parties also. But still in the election, the peremptory government of PDP maneuvered and won nearly all the seats in the 2003 election.

The content of this study and its end won’t be complete without a look at some review of popular government. In one of its special edition and columnar on Africa’s new republic, the European Acp journal takes a critical look on how Africa embarked on the part of republic and now predictable dubieties are beginning to toss in not only are people decreasingly asking whether the western popular model is a suitable bone for Africa and Nigeria in particular Africa who are European mates are the agents of republic and they vend it as a commodity of the third world.

According to Lewis( 1965), all who are affected by a decision should have the chance to share in making that decision either directly or through chosen representation. The will of the maturity shall prevail.

He posited that, in the first description of republic, the man who stands for election represent groups with different ideas, interest or characteristics, and the real contest between these groups. So to count the losing groups from participation in decision timber, easily violates the first description of republic. He asserts that Europe and France practice class society where single party is applicable. In Africa and particularly in Nigeria, we exercise plural society, which isn’t just inapplicable; it’s completely immoral in thickness with the first description of republic. It’s also destructive of any prospect on erecting a nation in which different people might live together in harmony. According to him, the problem with Africa is the principle of plurality which is consequential of differences in lines, languages, religion, race, in a long tradition of collective hostility. In fact, people are mutually antipathetic they’re literal adversaries.

The popular problem in a plural society remains the creation of political institution which gives all the colorful groups a single occasion to share in decision timber. thus, a single party which include a representative of all the colorful groups and encourage full discussion within the party frame would be superior to a competition for power between parties representing different lines, race or religion, political party as one of the recent inventions of the mortal race can not be avoided in any maws republic because of the millions are to bounce, they’ve to learn how to cast their vote.

The literature reveals that the relationship between political parties and popular governance is depended on the literal development of the party and party structure. still, the broad wind of democratization since the 1990s has impacted on political processes and party systems. The being literature appears to have neglected this aspect of the development of Nigerian political parties. Also we discovered that not important has been written on the part of political parties in Nigerian incipient republic. This study is an attempt to fill this gap. This study seeks to examine some of the political profitable factors of metamorphosis of Nigerian political parties, their places and how these have impacted on popular governance in Nigeria.