By any serious standard, democracy is measured not by how comfortable political actors feel, but by whether citizens retain the power to choose. It is against this benchmark that recent claims warning of a looming “democracy without competition” must be examined and found wanting.
The argument, popularised in recent commentary ahead of the 2027 elections, rests on a fundamental misreading of both democracy and Nigeria’s political reality. It confuses political disadvantage with democratic erosion, and loss of influence with loss of freedom.
Democracy does not impose a duty on a ruling party to preserve its opponents. It guarantees rights freedom of association, speech, contestation, and the vote not political relevance. Parties earn competitiveness; they are not entitled to it. When politicians defect, alliances shift, or platforms weaken, these are political outcomes, not constitutional violations.
To portray defections as evidence of coercion without proof is intellectually lazy and politically convenient. Nigerian politicians are not hostages; they are actors. They respond to incentives, ideology, ambition, and survival. If opposition parties are losing members, the honest question is not who is forcing them out, but why they no longer inspire confidence.
Much of the current anxiety also ignores Nigeria’s delicate sociopolitical balance. This is not an abstract democracy operating in a vacuum. It is a diverse federation with deep demographic, ethnic, and regional sensitivities. Stability management in such a context is not authoritarianism it is responsibility. Political maturity demands sensitivity to national mood, timing, and equilibrium.
This is where the informal but enduring “pendulum principle” matters. Nigeria’s Fourth Republic has survived in part because power has broadly rotated between North and South in eight-year cycles. This understanding is not codified law, but it is political common sense in a plural society. Pretending not to understand it while invoking national stability is a dangerous contradiction.
Equally misleading is the suggestion that democracy faces extinction if a sitting president completes two terms. Democracy did not end in 2015 when Buhari was re-elected, nor did institutions collapse when power remained with one party at the centre. Courts functioned, elections were held, opposition governors emerged, and civic space endured. There is no credible reason to suggest 2027 would be different.
Quoting past opposition rhetoric against today’s incumbents may be clever, but it is hollow. Opposition language is not a governing constraint. Protecting democratic rights does not mean weakening one’s own party, freezing political consequences, or guaranteeing electoral parity. Democracy protects competition it does not manufacture it.
At its core, the present disquiet reflects not democratic decay, but political miscalculation. Some actors misread the national mood, mistimed ambition, or misplayed alliances. Strategic failure is not persecution. Loss of leverage is not repression. And irrelevance is not injustice.
Democracy rewards preparation, not protest alone. The answer to dominance is organisation, ideas, coalition-building, and patience not alarmism dressed as principle.
As Nigeria approaches 2027, the choice before political actors is clear. They can either engage voters with credible alternatives or retreat into rhetoric that equates entitlement with democracy. Elections remain open. The ballot remains sovereign. The courts remain available.
In a functioning democracy, the standard is simple: let the people decide and let the most prepared win.
Otunba Segun Showunmi
The Alternative.
