Daily Trust Editorial, Friday March 27, 2026
The country’s political space has been electrified ahead of the next general elections scheduled for 2027. Frontline political parties have held, or have scheduled to hold, their congresses from wards to states in preparation for their national conventions. As a sign that most parties have not learnt lessons from previous years of unstable party leadership, there are indications that ward and state congresses are being marred by the exclusion of some candidates and the imposition of others.
Moneybags and hopeful contestants for elective positions in the executive and legislative arms of government are engaged in political manoeuvres to ensure their preferred candidates take over party leadership at lower levels. No doubt, the seeds for future implosion are being sown in our political parties; they will germinate, grow, and lead to a harvest of court cases, instability, and ineffectiveness of the parties.
The ruling party, for instance, is riddled with crises at the state level. The power struggle between Benue State Governor Hyacinth Alia and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, has not abated despite several reconciliation efforts and an intervention by Vice President Kashim Shettima. There are still two factions of the APC in the state—one loyal to Akume and the other to Governor Alia.
The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, who has held down the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has positioned his loyalists in the APC in Rivers State to take over the party’s leadership. Effectively, Wike and Rotimi Amaechi, also a former governor of Rivers State, are slugging it out in a contest that has become very bitter and may lead to court cases.
Oyo State presents another power struggle that can be damaging to the APC. The main politicians at the centre of the disagreements are Adebayo Adelabu (Minister of Power), Zach Adedeji (Executive Chairman of NRS), and members of the Ireakari Group, such as Debo Adesina, Ope Adisa, Waheed Ogundipe, Dimeji Adewole, Dr. Wale Akinleye, and Olusegun Adekunle. These factions are clashing over control of the party structure ahead of the 2027 elections. States like Osun, Akwa Ibom, Delta, and Kano are embroiled in similar crises. The PDP and Labour Party are also embroiled in internal crises that have weakened their capacity to compete effectively in the next elections.
An example of how mischievous party leadership can lead to the collapse of a party, with a negative effect on democracy, is found in the PDP. Between 2023 and 2026, the party has fallen from its giant status to the rubble. At its peak, the PDP controlled 28 out of Nigeria’s 36 states, making it the most dominant political party in the country’s history between 1999 and 2015.
This level of control gave the PDP overwhelming influence in both state and national politics. But due to its abandonment of internal democracy, an inability to enforce discipline, and the prioritisation of personal ambition over party stability, the party has lost stature and may not rise to the fight for power in 2027.
We call on all political parties to play by the rules as they elect their leaders to ensure that we have very strong and vibrant political parties as we enter the next elections. Weak party leadership undermines our democracy by eroding the role of political parties as stable, ideological institutions, transforming them instead into volatile platforms for personal ambition.
When leaders fail to enforce internal democracy or uphold their own constitutions, it triggers a cycle of defections, constant litigation, and factionalism that leaves the opposition fractured and unable to provide a credible alternative to the ruling party. This institutional instability weakens legislative oversight, as lawmakers often prioritise factional loyalty over national interest, and ultimately disenfranchises voters who lose faith in a system that appears more focused on internal power struggles than on governance and policy.
To ensure the 2027 primaries produce truly credible candidates, political parties must prioritise a return to strict internal democracy by moving away from the “consensus” model, which is often used to mask the imposition of handpicked favourites. Instead, parties should adopt standardised direct primaries to allow the broader membership—rather than a small circle of powerful delegates—to decide their flagbearers.
This shift from “godfatherism” to a merit-based contest ensures that those who emerge have a genuine popular mandate, making them more competitive and credible in the general elections. Political parties are the backbone of representative democracy. Therefore, dynamic party leadership is crucial to democracy. Nigeria’s experience shows that when parties fracture, it weakens their electoral chances and undermines democratic consolidation.