BY LAWRENCE EGEDE
There is a ghost that still walks through Nigeria’s political landscape, and nowhere does it whisper more loudly than in the Southeast. That ghost is PDP 2015, a moment of supreme confidence, internal cracks, elite arrogance, mass discontent, and eventual collapse at the polls. Anyone who thinks that episode is ancient history is not paying attention.
The signs are reappearing, the patterns are familiar, and the danger is real. This time, the shadow hangs over the All Progressives Congress (APC), and the Southeast must tread carefully.
Politics, they say, is local. But in Nigeria today, politics is also international, economic, religious, and security-driven. The stakes have risen far beyond party flags and campaign slogans. Nigeria is under global observation, internal pressure, and social strain. In such a climate, political mistakes are not easily forgiven by voters at home or observers abroad.
My fear is simple but deep: the Southeast may once again invest its political energy in a party riddled with internal cracks, elite arrogance, and unaddressed contradictions, just as it did with the PDP in 2015.
In 2015, the Peoples Democratic Party was already bleeding before the elections arrived. Internal supremacy battles, impunity by powerful party figures, disregard for grassroots sentiment, and the belief that power was a birthright rather than a trust weakened the party from within. Yet, even as the structure shook, the Southeast held firmly to PDP, trying to keep it afloat.
The zone carried the cross of PDP loyalty at a time when many political actors elsewhere were defecting in droves to where the “political fruits” seemed ripe. The Southeast stayed. It mobilized. It voted. It defended the party. And yet, when the dust settled, the party collapsed nationally, and the Southeast was left politically isolated, loyal to a sinking ship while others negotiated relevance in the new order.
The cracks that broke PDP in 2015 did not magically disappear. They merely went underground. To this day, those fractures; ego clashes, imposition of candidates, disrespect for internal democracy, and the “shoulder-high” behavior of political heavyweights continue to haunt the party.
Now, look closely at APC today. Strip away the glamour of mass defections, the celebratory rallies, and the loud declarations of dominance, and you will see something troubling: the same crackpot disease.
There is growing arrogance among some power blocs. There is intolerance of dissent. There is the belief that electoral victory is guaranteed by force of incumbency rather than performance. There is elite congestion too, many heavy heads competing for control, too many interests pulling in different directions, too many hands stirring the same political broth.
History teaches us that political parties do not collapse because of opposition strength alone. They collapse because they rot from inside while pretending to be invincible.
The Southeast must ask itself an uncomfortable question: Who is sure that what happened to PDP will not happen to APC? The track is already rough. Governance pressures are intense. Economic hardship bites deep. Security challenges persist. Public patience is thin.
Politics is not daisy. It is brutal, unforgiving, and impatient with arrogance.
The defection of Governor David Umahi from PDP to APC did not happen in a vacuum. It was the product of frustration, disappointment, and the failure of PDP’s internal mechanisms. Umahi and other stakeholders in the Southeast labored to keep PDP alive in the zone, even when the party’s national leadership appeared disconnected from local realities.
In the end, disappointment won. Ebonyi moved with Umahi, but the broader Southeast remained politically fragmented, some in APC, some in PDP, some clinging to APGA, and others merely floating where personal interest dictates.
Anambra State’s APGA experience offers a lesson of a different kind. By holding firmly to a party identity, even while maintaining strategic relationships, Anambra avoided the total political confusion that mass defections often bring. It did not win everything, but it did not lose itself.
Defections are seductive. They come with promises of relevance, protection, and reward. They are often celebrated with music, crowds, and loud speeches. But defections are not strategy; they are symptoms; ie symptoms of ideological emptiness and opportunism.
When the chips are down, defections produce defective results. Those who rush in for advantage are often the first to disappear when the tide turns. Loyalty becomes negotiable. Conviction evaporates. Trust dies.
As the old adage warns us: All that glitters is not gold. Another reminds us that many hands on the broil spoil the broth. Power overcrowded with selfish interests eventually collapses under its own weight.
The 2027 elections will not occur in a vacuum. They will take place under intense local and international scrutiny. Nigeria’s security challenges, economic pressures, social discontent, and international image have placed the country on sensitive watchlists. Any assumption that elections will be “business as usual” is pure daydreaming.
The masses are angry, hungry, and increasingly unpredictable. Money politics may still play a role, but hunger has a way of eroding fear and loyalty. When survival is threatened, conscience becomes negotiable, and protest votes become attractive.
The Bible’s warning in Luke 10:20 is timely: “Rejoice not that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven.” It is a caution against overconfidence, the same overconfidence that blinded PDP before its fall.
The Southeast stands at a crossroads. Fragmentation weakens bargaining power. Opportunistic movement breeds suspicion. Ideological confusion erodes trust. What the zone needs now is clarity, unity, and discipline.
This is not a call for blind loyalty to any party. It is a call for strategic alignment, choosing a political platform based on long-term interest, internal justice, respect, and genuine inclusion, not short-term gains or elite pressure.
The Southeast must “look for the black goat before nightfall." This is a metaphor for urgency and preparedness. Delay will only reduce options. Indecision will only empower external interests. Unity, even if imperfect, is stronger than scattered brilliance.
The ghost of PDP 2015 is not a myth. It is a warning. APC must listen, and the Southeast must learn. Overconfidence kills parties. Arrogance blinds leadership. Defections excite crowds but rarely build legacy.
Tomorrow is indeed pregnant. What the Southeast does today will determine whether it delivers relevance or regret in 2027.
Politics rewards the wise, not the noisy. And history is merciless to those who refuse to learn from it.
