When Defection Becomes Doctrine: Law, Power, And The Alliance Of Convenient Democrats

By Lanre Ogundipe

Nigeria’s political evolution has produced many paradoxes, but few are as revealing—or as consequential—as the phenomenon of cross-carpeting. What was once exceptional has gradually hardened into a political culture, a doctrine of convenience that now sits uneasily with constitutional order and democratic ethics.

At the centre of this reality lies not just one party or coalition, but a pattern that cuts across the entire political class. Platforms change. Actors remain. Alignments shift. Interests endure. The question is no longer whether defection is occurring, but whether it has become the organising principle of Nigerian politics.

The law, at least on paper, is unambiguous. Sections 68(1)(g) and 109(1)(g) of the 1999 Constitution provide that a legislator who defects from the party that sponsored his election must vacate his seat, except in cases of division within the party or merger.

The logic is sound. Electoral mandates are not personal trophies; they are political trusts anchored on party platforms. When that platform is abandoned, the legitimacy of continued representation is called into question.

In theory, the law is firm.

In practice, it is elastic.

Defections occur with striking regularity. Consequences rarely follow. The constitutional exception of “division within the party” has been stretched into a convenient justification, invoked repeatedly to legitimise movement that is, in essence, political repositioning.

What was designed as a safeguard has become an escape route.

Recent efforts by the National Assembly to tighten the process—requiring formal resignation and clearer procedural steps—acknowledge the problem. Yet they also expose a deeper truth: Nigeria does not lack laws; it lacks the discipline to enforce them.

If defection were confined to one political party, it might be dismissed as internal instability. But it cuts across all parties—from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC), from the Labour Party to the African Democratic Congress (ADC).

This is where the real problem emerges.

Defection across all parties does not invalidate the law. It exposes the absence of ideological anchoring within the system.

Political parties are expected to represent distinct ideas, policies, and visions. In Nigeria, they often function instead as vehicles for power acquisition. When politicians move, they are rarely transitioning between competing philosophies. They are switching platforms while retaining the same networks, methods, and ambitions.

What changes is the vehicle. What remains is the driver.

It is within this context that the current coalition around the African Democratic Congress must be understood.

ADC was conceived as a third-force platform, a response to elite dominance and a potential vehicle for renewal. Yet its present configuration reflects a convergence of actors whose trajectories span both the PDP era and the APC ascendancy.

These are not outsiders to power. They are, in many cases, its long-standing custodians.

During the PDP’s extended rule from 1999 to 2015, many of these figures occupied central positions within the state. With the emergence of the APC in 2015, several repositioned and remained influential, playing key roles within the Buhari administration.

The current moment represents another realignment.

The restructuring of power under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu altered internal balances. Established hierarchies shifted. Political space narrowed for some and expanded for others.

Out of that recalibration has emerged a coalition.

ADC, in this sense, is less a new political force than a reassembly of familiar actors. It is not the emergence of a new class, but the repositioning of an existing one.

This, in itself, is not illegitimate. Political realignments are part of democratic evolution. But their credibility depends on clarity of purpose and consistency of principle.

Where those are absent, questions arise.

Is this convergence driven by shared vision, or by shared circumstance? Is it renewal, or merely rearrangement?

The pattern of movement provides an answer.

Across the political landscape, party affiliation has become fluid to the point of abstraction. Politicians migrate with ease, often without any demonstrable shift in ideological position. Party platforms become temporary addresses rather than enduring commitments.

This fluidity carries consequences.

It undermines the voter mandate. Citizens vote for parties based on programmes and promises. When elected officials abandon those platforms without consequence, the link between voter choice and governance weakens.

It erodes institutional credibility. Laws that are inconsistently enforced lose authority. What remains is not the rule of law, but the rule of convenience.

It distorts political competition. Elections become less about ideas and more about alignments.

It creates a marketplace of political convenience.

Within this marketplace, the present coalition assumes a definable character—an Alliance of Convenient Democrats.

The phrase is descriptive, not dismissive.

Convenience, in this context, has become systemic. Movement is driven less by conviction than by calculation.

Here lies the limitation of the law.

Lanre Ogundipe, Public Affairs analyst, former President, Nigeria, and the African Union of Journalists writes from Abuja.

The constitutional provisions on defection were designed to stabilise the system. But they operate within a political environment that rewards movement. Where incentives favour defection, legal constraints are stretched and often bypassed.

The problem, therefore, is not simply that the law is flawed. It is that it exists within a system that does not reward adherence.

Selective enforcement compounds the issue. Legislators are, in theory, constrained. Yet even within that category, enforcement is inconsistent. For other political actors—governors, ministers, party leaders—no such constraints exist.

This creates a dual structure.

The law binds some. It accommodates others.

In such an environment, compliance becomes optional.

The greater danger lies in normalisation.

When defection becomes routine, it ceases to attract scrutiny. When legal provisions are routinely navigated, they cease to deter. Over time, what was once exceptional becomes accepted practice.

And when practice hardens into culture, reform becomes difficult.

Nigeria now stands at such a point.

Postscript: When the Referee Blows the Whistle

As the theatre of realignment gathers pace, the intervention of the electoral umpire offers a sobering reminder: even political convenience has limits.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), acting within the context of ongoing disputes, has moved to delist the names of David Mark and Rauf Aregbesola as National Chairman and National Secretary of the African Democratic Congress, while withholding recognition of activities tied to the contested leadership.

This is more than administrative housekeeping. It is institutional signalling.

A coalition that seeks to reorder national power must first resolve questions of order within itself. Authority in a democracy is not conferred by prominence, but grounded in process.

INEC’s action underscores a quiet truth: that even in a system where laws are often negotiated, they retain the capacity to reassert themselves.

For the coalition, this is a test of coherence and compliance.

For the system, it is a reminder that legitimacy cannot be improvised.

Nigeria does not lack laws governing political behaviour. What it lacks is a political culture that treats those laws as binding.

And in that absence, defection continues—not as an aberration, but as a defining feature.

For when every party becomes a temporary address, movement is no longer remarkable.

It becomes routine.

And when it becomes routine, the law is not necessarily broken. It is simply ignored.

*Lanre Ogundipe, Public Affairs analyst, former President, Nigeria, and the African Union of Journalists writes from Abuja.