Stakeholders in Nigeria’s political space have condemned the exclusion of indirect voting in party primary elections, describing it as interference in the internal affairs of political parties and contrary to the position of the courts that such matters should be determined by the parties themselves.

Recall that under the new Electoral Act signed into law by Bola Ahmed Tinubu after it was passed by the National Assembly of Nigeria, the use of indirect primaries (delegate system) was completely abolished as a method for political parties to select their candidates.

While the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) called for the urgent restoration of indirect primaries in Nigeria’s political system, insisting that political parties must retain the constitutional right to determine how they select their candidates, a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Ogun State, Segun Sowunmi, said that the passage of the law was painful but must be studied and understood.

Also speaking, lawyer and founder of Yiaga Africa, Samson Itodo, described the law as ironic and hypocritical, arguing that the government should have allowed political parties to determine their preferred mode of selecting candidates. Sowunmi noted that once an electoral law is signed, citizens and political actors must take time to study its provisions and understand its implications.

He added that Nigeria must learn to respect its electoral laws instead of changing them every four years. “The last Act we used, if we had just continued with it, we would not be learning and trying to understand new ones. Now we are in the middle of the game, and a new Act has been introduced with its own challenges. Whatever the case may be, nobody expects a political party not to produce candidates.