Peter Obi, Kwankwaso Affected as NDC Unveils New Defection Policy

Peter Obi, Kwankwaso Affected as NDC Unveils New Defection Policy
Candidates must sign affidavits before receiving the party’s ticket.
Party cites Labour Party defections as reason for policy.

The Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) has introduced a strict anti-defection policy requiring all candidates seeking elective positions on its platform to sign indemnity and affidavit forms before receiving the party’s ticket.

The policy, unveiled on Tuesday at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja, mandates that any candidate elected on the NDC platform must vacate their seat if they defect to another political party before the end of their tenure.

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EKO HOT BLOG reports that the new rule is expected to affect prominent members of the party, including its presidential candidate, Peter Obi, his running mate, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, and other politicians who recently joined the party ahead of the 2027 general elections.

Speaking during the signing ceremony attended by candidates and aspirants, the National Chairman of the NDC, Moses Cleopas, said the decision was aimed at protecting the party’s mandate and strengthening internal discipline.

According to him, the party could no longer tolerate a situation where politicians win elections under a party’s platform and later abandon the same party after assuming office.

Cleopas said the policy was approved during the party’s National Executive Committee meeting as part of broader efforts to ensure elected officials remain accountable to the political platform that sponsored them.

“In our last NEC meeting, a motion was moved, supported, and established that when we take over the government, people elected on the platform of our party must respect the party’s instrument,” Cleopas said.

“This is not just a party for one man to rise and achieve his ambitions and do anything he likes with the party.

“This is a political party that we desire to groom and hand over to the next generation.”

The NDC chairman said the party had observed a recurring pattern in which elected public office holders distance themselves from the political structures that brought them into power.

“One thing we have come to observe is that in the present polity, when people contest elections and win under political parties, they become gods.

“And in between the time that they ought to have, they will just use one minor excuse to dump the platform and perhaps go into the ruling party,” he said.

Cleopas cited the experience of the Labour Party following the 2023 general elections as one of the factors that informed the decision to introduce the new policy.

According to him, several politicians elected on the Labour Party platform later left the party, weakening its political influence despite its electoral gains.

“A very typical example that we have all seen in the last three years is the Labour Party, where so many individuals won elections under the platform of the party,” he said.

“Now, we are in another election cycle. Go and check their history. How many of the people who won elections under the Labour Party and were inaugurated are still members of the party?

“If all of them had remained, you and I can imagine how the Labour Party could have been today, even if they had not won the presidency. When you see these kinds of things happening, it is expedient that you start to think of how to guide your political parties,” he added.

Cleopas maintained that membership of the NDC remains voluntary but stressed that anyone seeking elective office on the party’s platform must be prepared to abide by its rules.

“If you want to contest the election under the platform of the NDC, you are free to come. Nobody is forcing you. But when you come, you should know that there are certain rules by which we, as a political party, guide our members,” he said.

Peter Obi, Kwankwaso Affected as NDC Unveils New Defection Policy

“One of them is that if you contest an election under our platform and win, under no circumstances, as against what is provided for in the 1999 constitution, that you will just wake up to say that I don’t like the NDC again, or I don’t like the face of my national or state chairman. Therefore, now that I am already elected, I am leaving the party.”