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Political calculations are already ongoing ahead of the 2027 general elections three years away.
There are reports that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the Labour Party (LP), the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) are planning to form a formidable party that will sack the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
In this exclusive interview on Channels Television, a political economist, Professor Pat Utomi, confirms that the parties’ candidates in the 2023 presidential poll have agreed to form a mega party. He also speaks on talks that led to the creation of the APC in 2014 as well as his relationship with President Bola Tinubu.
See excerpts below:
Give us an idea. Are you planning a merger or a brand new political party?
It’s a really clean start. You have to start from the premise that Nigeria has not had a political party since 1999. And let’s be very honest with ourselves. What we have managed is to create platforms that enable machine politics from which to grab power, usually for the purpose of state capture. If you will want to test that, check how much the quality of life of a Nigerian has improved since 1999.
It’s frightening but the truth is a matter that in 1999, a political class managed to build a certain coalition of accommodation to keep the military out and share the spoils of power in Nigeria and somehow did not manage to create an alignment with the Nigerian people to improve the quality of their lives. This is why you can see Nigeria deteriorating, becoming the poverty capital of the world, becoming the centre of widespread violence everywhere. And if you want to take some clear examples, I want anybody who is a political scientist, or economist in Nigeria to look at where India was in 1999 and where Nigeria was in terms of mood, violence in politics, the quality of life of people and where they both are today in Nigeria versus India.
In 1991, India was technically bankrupt. Foreign Reserves could not accommodate more than three weeks of trading. What has happened since 1999 is that India’s politics has managed to focus on the rational engagement of a developmental state.
If you look at the numbers today, India is now speeding past the so-called miracle economies of South-East Asia. Nigeria, on the other hand, has been traveling in the reverse direction. What better explanation can there be than the fact that Nigeria has not managed to organise the structures for political participation that can focus on the Nigerian people and lift their lives?
So, a political party is a vehicle to bring onboard those who will govern the nation.
Absolutely the point, political party is a vehicle for doing that…
