Merger: Opposition parties should go for it

SIR: Perhaps we all do not know that the future of our democracy and, indeed, the future of Nigeria’s political and economic strength lie in the strength of the political opposition. By political opposition, we certainly would not mean a particular political party or parties today but whichever party may be in the opposition in the future that is virile enough to be an alternative choice of the electorate in a presidential election.
As at today, Nigeria does not have a political party which can boast of being an alternative government at the centre, and, so, we are yet to have a political opposition in the real sense of it. What we run is a one-party system disguised in an ostensible multi-party system.
Because of the absence of a virile opposition, the progress Nigeria has recorded so far has come only by trial and error or by sheer luck, so much so that all our visions as a nation which are aimed at self-sufficiency, stable electricity, standard road networks etc. have come as mere jokes.
An unchallenged ruling party would run at its own pace, if it does not become dictatorial or absolute in the process, and the whole nation would be at its mercy, waiting helplessly, regardless of the electoral rituals of four-year intervals.
A multi-party system which is not able to achieve anything better than this for a nation cannot be said to be an evolving, let alone perfect, democratic system.
It is in the light of this that we must rightly view the current moves by the A.C.N, C.P.C and A.N.P.P to merge into one political party as a nationalistic proposition, whether or not they are able to topple the P.D.P at first attempt in 2015.
While plurality or mushrooming of political parties portrays a people as free and imbued with fundamental human rights, it also portrays them as purposeless and unserious. If power, truly, is the goal of political parties, then plurality or mushrooming of political parties can even be stupid and reflective of our lack of unity as bane of nationhood.
We all need to realize this bane and rise up to prevent it; to cure the inadvertently designed self-retardation. It is gratifying that the A.C.N, C.P.C and A.N.P.P are taking the merger initiative today as it should be, as against the creation of two-party system by a decree during the Babangida military regime.
•Jide Oguntoye
TheNation