No government can be accurately described as democratic if it does not have a functional opposition that is holding it accountable to the people. One of the differences between a democracy and a dictatorship is the nature of opposition that is in existence the country. In the constitutional context, by “opposition” we refer to those politicians who are not part of the government in power, who do not share the same operational ideology but still support the government on all national efforts intended for the benefit of the generality of the people. The opposition does not have to behave like a nattery nabob of negativism chorusing “nay, nay, nay” at every point.
For a start, it must be pointed out that, beyond the general constitutional convention in practice in the country, there is actually no specific constitutional establishment of “opposition office” for political parties in Nigeria as the basis for holding the government in power “responsible and accountable” to the people as we have it textually stated in favour of the Mass Media or the Press in section 22 of the Constitution.
The constitutional role of the Press in holding government accountable is not necessarily coterminous with those of the opposition unless when a particular media establishment, either by reasons of proprietary commitment or partisan political alliance, decides to put on the garb of an “opposition media” outfit instead of that of a “pro-people” institution as anticipated by the Constitution, a development which could therefore strip such a partisan media outfit of the larger constitutional protection available to the media.
In England, the role of the opposition party and opposition leadership are statutorily spelt out coupled with special salaries, offices and facilities available to whoever the opposition parties present to the Speaker of the House of Commons as the ‘leader of the opposition.” The situation in Nigeria today is akin to that which exists in the US where there is an opposition but with no specific office or role set out for it. There is however the important distinction that unlike the situation in the US and elsewhere, there is no identifiable ideological differences between the Nigerian “ruling party” and “opposition” parties. Today, APC is the ruling party but it is full of people who were once in other parties like the PDP while the PDP, the main opposition party, has many defectors from the APC and vice versa.
Matters are further complicated by the fact that in both the US and England, a particular party is identified as the opposition party or the “alternate government” in waiting because they both operate the two-party system within which power periodically oscillate even though there are several “third parties” that do not enjoy such recognition because of their limited sizes and membership. Here in Nigeria, we operate the multi-party system in which several parties exist and each wants to be recognised as such which further weakens the “opposition,” being of different make-up, pulling at different directions even if generally calculated to resist the ruling party in any way possible.
To a considerable extent, politicians in Nigeria do not distinguish themselves along ideology lines, values and principles, a fact which does not give sufficient credibility to criticisms accruing from them because, given the opportunity, they will do exactly what the party in power is doing because they have no applicable sets of guiding beliefs, practices and methodologies. We saw how easily it was for members of LP in the National Assembly to be assimilated into the old corruptive politics of selfish interests as none of them thought it fit to act differently when it came to appropriating so much money and largesse to themselves at the expense of the suffering masses of Nigeria which the “Obidients” in particular are supposed to represent.
However, by our adopting constitutional democracy in which government is subject to tenure, operational and jurisdictional limitations occasioned by federalism, the idea of “opposition” has automatically become a core part of Nigeria’s political process especially for reasons of accountability. This is what has made it difficult for observers of Nigerian politics to accept the credibility of the opposition voices even though it is expected that “a key component of democracy is the toleration of dissent and that the only condition is that dissenters do not engage in violating the rights of others and use of force, deception or fraud to pursue their interests and goals.”
Opposition to autocratic regimes like colonial and military dictatorship is quite different from the role of opposition in constitutional democracies. You can only be properly recognised as a legitimate opposition party if there is a legitimate government that is constitutionally expected to be held accountable. Contestations and rancor during election seasons automatically end after the elections while governance starts thereafter and that is when opposition parties can properly function as expected.
There is a difference between denying the legitimacy of a government and playing the role of opposition in a democracy. From the US and English experiences, both the government in power and the opposition must be mutually accepted as legitimate for there to be a functional opposition in place and, in the case of England, the opposition is even a formal statutory office with defined official responsibilities accompanied by certain perquisites of office.
On the contrary, we have people seeking to play the role of the opposition but are unwilling to accord the requisite recognition to the government in power. It would seem as if the old logic for opposing the military dictators in the past has now been adopted against democratic civilian governments by our opposition parties, forgetting that they are also a part of the democratic process. That fact can be gleaned from the statement made by the LP spokesperson, Dr. Yunusa Tanko, during the Sunrise Daily live show on Channels TV on Monday, the 4th of December, 2023, when he said that he does not personally accept the legitimacy of the present Nigerian Federal Government even after he was reminded that the Supreme Court has since affirmed its legitimacy.
Nigeria needs a purposeful, realistic and credible opposition because “Liberty cannot be preserved, nor economy of efficiency secured, without the exercise of a somewhat suspicious vigilance on the part of some portion of the public.” However, that purpose will not be served by partisans indiscriminately shouting “nay, nay, nay” to everything government because that way, Nigerians will begin to see the pretenses and manifest bad faith embedded in the opposition enterprise.
Recently certain questionable government steps were justly criticized by members of the opposition but unfortunately, it was done in a reckless manner that did not quite show seriousness or altruism. For example, the PDP, even before seeing the contents of the national budget recently presented to the National Assembly, glibly wrote it off as “hopeless” and with sundry other negative adjectives without pointing to specific elements or provisions in the budget to buttress its premature condemnation. Opposition should not just be exercises in abusive and the combative hauling of unguarded insults at individuals across the isle because such unnecessary show of belligerence only goes to weaken its viability and ultimately its credibility.
There was also the obvious scandal of as many as 1,411 Nigerians who registered as “delegates” at this year’s COP28 environmental conference in Dubai. For a country currently reeling in abject poverty as Nigeria is, such a mammoth crowd only confirms a condemnable culture of waste, jamboree and unabating profligacy. Unfortunately, the opposition missed a wonderful opportunity to criticize the government by simply describing the entire delegation as “government sponsored” when in fact a substantial number of them are NGO participants, private businesses and many non-state attendees. So, what would have been an irrefutable criticism of bad government act somehow became a case of untamed opposition exaggeration intent at rubbishing the government and, by implication, unfairly demarketing Nigeria as there was no accuracy in the accusation.
There was also Peter Obi’s very loud criticism of the “wicked” demolition of buildings allegedly built on officially forbidden places in parts of the country. But if history is of any use to humanity, a person like Peter Obi should not talk wherever they are discussing the wickedness of official destruction of houses as a form of sanction because it was Peter Obi as governor who actually introduced the “cruel and unusual punishment” of house demolition to Nigeria in his determined bid to tackle the criminality in Anambra state. To now hear him talking bitterly against the pulling down of houses is like Mr. Kettle calling Chief Pot black.
It has equally been said that “Democracy in Nigeria will develop if the opposition appropriately appreciates its role and adequately carries out same with the expected altruistic motives” [Egbewole and Etudaiye (2010)]. The opposition making outlandish and wild claims, incessantly dishing out insults and unguarded derogatory and fighting statements about Nigeria, calculated to mislead the public or undermine the government in power, without suggesting how things could have been done better, be it ideologically or policy-wise, are signs of grievous misunderstanding of the opposition’s role in a constitutional democracy.