Buba Galadima, secretary of the board of trustees (BoT) of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), says Electoral Act 2026 was designed to frustrate opposition parties.
Speaking at the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) aspirants’ summit held in Abuja on Saturday, Galadima alleged that President Bola Tinubu-led government has “destroyed democracy” in Nigeria.
Galadima further alleged that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) set up a committee long before the electoral bill was presented to the national assembly to draft a legislation that would favour the party.
He criticised provisions of the law relating to the emergence of party candidates.
“By the time the national assembly deliberated and finalised on the draft electoral bill, within an hour, the president was signing the bill,” he said.
“Did he study that bill? So, it means they have already prepared a bill before him.
“What were the contents of that bill? One of them which concerns this summit is that you can only generate candidates through two ways. That is, through consensus or through direct primaries.
“Now, in the opinion of the APC and its government, they thought that the opposition will not be in a position to sit down and do consensus.
“And if they can’t do consensus, the only option open to them is to go and do direct primaries. I want to say, without fear of being contradicted, that no political party in the opposition can do direct primaries and come out completely clean.”
He cautioned party members and aspirants against adopting direct primaries ahead of the 2027 elections, urging them to embrace consensus arrangements instead.
Galadima also warned that attempting direct primaries could leave the NDC without candidates for the elections.
“As I speak to you now, NDC is the strongest political platform that can successfully challenge the APC and root it out of government,” he said.
“The party cannot afford to do primaries because they will send people to disrupt everything and we end up without a candidate.
“So, it is better for us to maintain unity, to maintain loyalty to the party and to the decision of the elders of this party or the major stakeholders of all our constituencies that whoever emerges as a candidate for any constituency in this country, we will all support that person to succeed.”
