Is Nigeria Becoming a One-Party Nation?
By
Dr. Wunmi Akintide
 
As I watch the Democratic Party in America cruise back to power yesterday in a landslide victory against a sitting President and his Party, I cannot help but think about Nigeria and how our current President, Obasanjo has more or less proved himself a total failure. The expectation was high in 1999 when he was brought out of prison to come lead a Party formed by a rainbow coalition of the G.34 Group, the political machine assiduously put together by the late General Musa Y'Ardua and some prominent multi millionaire retired Generals in Nigeria.

The PDP which has emerged as the octopus Party eventually went ahead to win the Presidential elections which were known to have been massively rigged at the time. If the 1999 elections were massively rigged, the 2003 elections were even worse as clearly proved by the eventual dismissal of Governor Ngige of Anambra State by a Court of Law, after close to three years as Governor in a 4 year tenure. 

It was a thug of War before the GNPP and the AD were able to retain a few seats in 1999 to form some credible opposition to the PDP. In 2003, through a well orchestrated rigging plan that were mercilessly executed by Obasanjo and his hatchet men, both the AD and the GNPP were further reduced to mere punctuation marks in the poltical map of Nigeria. The AD was virtually wiped off the map while the GNPP only held sway in a few states in the North. Right now the PDP is claiming to be the largest Party and by far the most powerful and the most corrupt and ruthless given its track record in governance.

In more civilized countries like America and much of the Western world today, a party like the PDP would not only lose the next elections in Nigeria, they would be totally rejected by the voters and one of the newly floated parties given a chance to go prove their mettle while the PDP is left licking its wounds in much the same way like the Republican Party is doing right now. We do not have a thriving Democracy in Nigeria. What we have is  a pitiful Dictatorship of the worse order led by no one else than our current President.

When Obasanjo was brought back to power in 1999, many had expected he was going to really set the pace for other leaders after him. He has managed to fool the nation that he was one hell of a leader just like the late Murtala Mohammed who ruled our country for only 200 days. During that short tenure Murtala was able to set the nation on a path of rectitude that became the envy of his enemies. Little wonder that his enemies led ny Dimka and others quickly ganged up against him and had him assassinated before he was able to finish the job. Many People like me had wrongly believed at the time that Obasanjo, his Deputy was  another Murtala. But if Obasanjo's track record from 1999 till now is anything to go by, we have now come to know he was a fluke at best and a huge disppointment. 

Tell me your friends and I would tell you who you are. The greatest and the closest confidants of Obasanjo today are the likes of Annenih and Adedibu the strong man of Ibadan politics. The former Governor of Ekiti State was one of Obasanjo's favorites as Governor. The same Obasanjo is actively rooting for Andy Mba as the next Governor of Anambra State. He actually wanted Governor Obi impeached so as to create room for Mba to take over in 2007. The same Mba was reportedly charged for Money Landering in  Great Britain and could be heading for the prison as we speak, if much of what we read in the Internet is anything to be believed.

As long as you have only one Party dominating Nigerian politics, the country can hardly make progress. The ideal thing is to throw out the bums and let one of the new Parties with a promising manifesto try their luck. The voters should reserve the right to throw out any Party that does not perform. The PDP has been a total disaster, all things considered, and should be totally rejected at the polls come April or May 2007.

The voters should feel free to take their money, if offered, but they must go out to the polling booths to vote them out just like they do in more civilized countries. The PDP does not deserve to win the next election in Nigeria with the level of corruption in our country today. 30 out of the 36 Governors in Nigeria are under one investigation or another as we speak, and the great majority of them come from the ruling PDP.

What more evidence do we need? A few have been impeached and some are currently on the verge of being impeached. The President and his Vice are at daggers drawn due to one scandal or another pertaining to money and serious abuse of office that should warrant impeachment for both of them in more civilized countries around the world.

The PDP should go learn some lessons from what is happening in other decent countries of the world, and more so from the fallout from the American elections that have just been concluded.

I rest my case.

Dr. Wunmi Akintide