By Tonye Barcanista
At the return of democracy in the second republic, the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) and the Nigerian Peoples Party (NPP) were the dominant parties in the country. Of these three parties, the NPN was the first (and only) to adopt zoning of offices; the party chairmanship was ceded to the South while the presidential ticket to the north. The party equally made the green revolution (agriculture) a primary focus in their campaign.The other parties; ie UPN and NPP centered their campaign around welfarism and social justice/social change respectively.
In the third republic, the Social Democratic Party (SDP), which was the dominant party centred their messaging on welfarism and social justice. The other party, National Republican Convention (NRC) was conservatism leaning.
At the return of the fourth republic,democracy in 1999, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) - which still dominates the political space, as well as the All Nigeria Peoples Party (now defunct) pursued Social conservatism and Economic liberalism. The Alliance for Democracy (later Action Congress of Nigeria) adopted a combination of progressivism and welfarism.
While all parties between the period of 1979 and 2007 tailored their messaging in accordance with their respective agenda and Ideology, the Congress for Progrssive Change (CPC), which was formed in 2010 with the sole purpose of actualising the presidential ambition of General Muhammadu Buhari at the 2011 election, brought a new but sad dimension to the political arena. The CPC ran a vicious campaign that was never seen in the country - though their concentration was primarily in the northern part of the country. The consequence of that was a post-election violence that was never seen in Nigeria which cost the lives of members of National Youth Service Corp (NYSC) and other young Nigerians in Bauchi, Kano, Kaduna and other States - sadly no single perpetrator nor any of their soonsor was convicted.
In 2013, the ACN, CPC and ANPP entered into merger to birth the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the sole purpose of wrestling power from the then ruling PDP. During the 2015 electioneering the party deployed propaganda, hate speech, violent messaging and bigotry against then ruling PDP and her supporters. For the first time in Nigeria, the APC and her chieftains threatened to form a parallel government if the electoral outcome did not favor them - may I also add that the same chieftains of APC in 2014 charged residents in Osun State to mete jungle justice on anyone that sought to hijack their mandate in Osun gubernatorial election.
As a consequence of their vile speeches, the electoral atmosphere became extremely tensed with many fearing that a second Civil War may erupt. Though APC won the 2015 poll, the party successfully made hate speech, threat of violence, propaganda and several other vices as an electioneering norm to unseat an incumbent to attain power; only God knows what would have happen if the result was not in the APC's favor.
To make things worse, the party successfully reversed every democratic gains that Nigeria attained between 1999 and 2015 under successive PDP administrations - inflation rate is at all time high, insecurity is talk of the town, prices of commodities are skyrocketing on daily basis, pump prices of petrol and kerosene are not only exorbitant but relatively scarce, schools are shut down due to striking teaching and nonteaching staff, the polity is tensed - Nigerians are angry.
Therefore, it is incumbent on the electorates to be resolute and deliberate to #RecoverNigeria from the grip of the ruling APC in February 2023 poll: based on his manefesto and antecedents, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the PDP Presidential Candidate, is undisputably the best alternative for the to lead Nigeria from the pollution of the ruling APC.
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