If you are big on social media, you could already call the 2023 presidential elections for Mr Peter Obi of the Labour Party. Indeed, he is making some impact. Many young and vocal people I know, and many who would not want to have anything to do with politics (who would usually farm out the responsibility to someone else), are strongly backing him. The crowd behind Obi has turned out to be quite quarrelsome, taking down viciously anyone who does not agree with their opinions, to the level of demonising those they believe to be in opposition. I have my fair share of their excoriation, for indeed they have no time and no patience for long, convoluted explanations – which indeed are necessary for the right analysis to be done in a democracy, according to those who invented the idea. But that is a discussion for another day.
Also to be discussed on another opportune day, is why the Obi phenomenon is catching on among the urban young especially. They have every right to be disenchanted with the status quo. The oldies have messed up bigly over time, so anyone who sounds different may be attractive. Obi talks a good game – especially when it comes to lamenting about and comparing Nigeria with other nations with copious statistics. He has been called out on some of the statistics, but I am not one of those who believe he lies. You can only keep so many numbers in your head. However, when it comes to envisioning a new future for Nigeria, and responsibly allocating responsibility for where we are, I believe the gentleman can do much better.
The concern of this write-up though, is that many of the young Obi supporters are discounting the sheer import of having a party structure. Like some of us did in 2019, many of these supporters, including Obi and the Labour Party themselves, have alluded to the usual refrain that human beings are the structure. I have learnt. And in building a political party and contesting for the office of president in 2019, I acquired some bragging rights in addition to considerable knowledge of how things work. Human beings may form the structure for Obi on social media, but it reduces on the ground in some urban areas. But as you drill down to the real Nigerian society, the human party structure thing wanes almost into nothingness.
This is how I explained the reality of party structure to some friends on WhatsApp:
There are 774 local governments in Nigeria and almost 10,000 wards. Each ward is made up of between six to 10 villages or small towns. Some are made up of urban areas. In the early 1990s President Ibrahim Babangida created two political parties. He funded them and called them Social Democratic Party (SDP) and National Republican Convention (NRC). He built standard structures (offices) for them in ALL LOCAL GOVERNMENTS. Those structures are still there though taken over by state governments today. In 1998 Abdulsalami funded the key political parties with billions to show integrity that the military were leaving. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was a major beneficiary as they brought Obasanjo on board. Alliance for Democracy and the rest also benefited greatly at that time for it had been written into the Nigerian constitution that government will fund political parties. That funding continued, though reduced until 2011 when the PDP decided to scrap the idea as it got ready to rule for 60 years. I believe that the PDP felt sufficiently comfortable and wanted to consolidate its position. It was, however, a more decent way of pulling the rug from underneath new political ideas than what APC did in 2020 by militarily deregistering parties and getting the courts behind an unconstitutional action just because they could.
So, today perhaps only the two large parties have offices in 10,000 wards, 774 LGs, 36 states and FCT. In each ward and local governments are chairmen and secretaries and their deputies and a handful of really committed members – some of whom see the party work as their legitimate work in an environment of high unemployment. They meet regularly and are occasionally funded. – Sometimes money comes regularly depending on how they assert themselves. The funding that comes in from governors and their lackeys may have however led to situations where many of these structures are fraught with factionalisation and infighting (a wise upstart political party may look at exploiting this but has to rely on more than nice words or even saying bad things about the status quo). This constant funding aids mobilisation during elections. And of course, they are conduits for disbursement of bungs on election day. Each of the 178,000 polling booths thus gets well-funded for elections.
I am yet to see the mass mobilisation that can dislodge this sedimentary formation that sits atop Nigerian politics, though I’d be happy to see it dislodged. It will take tremendous amounts of investments, trust, MONEY, time, and even intellectual engagements at all levels to get this off, all the while fighting betrayers and deceivers and interlopers, and unserious pretenders. And mind you, most of the 10,000 wards are in far-flung places that are poverty and illiteracy wracked – effectively beyond the coverage of the almost-ubiquitous social media. Our people cannot understand all the fine grammar beyond Lagos, Port Harcourt, Owerri, Awka, Abuja, and a few other state capitals. All we have to do is activate our imagination. All the farmers, our uncles and old aunties we abandoned in the village. Those ones we avoid seeing when we visit home. The ones we say are witches and wizards. The drunkards and ne’er-do-wells, the ones who couldn’t make it far with their education or lack of it. The ones we complain loudly to when they call us for money. And of course, we have the millions of honest folks who have stayed back in many villages so that they may farm to fulfill our palates in the cities…. All those millions have found refuge in these structures.
