Unsolicited Advice to Peter Obi: How to Turn a Fragile Coalition into a Powerful Movement  By Malcolm Fabiyi

In the 2023 elections Peter Obi pulled off what must count as a major miracle in Nigerian politics. He led an erstwhile politically irrelevant and perennially underperforming Labour party platform that managed to garner only 5,074 votes nationwide in the 2019 presidential election to a 6,101,533 votetally in the 2023 presidential elections – a staggering 120,000% improvement in performance. 

The Obi coalition pulled off three spectacular victories  – besting Bola Tinubu in his home base of Lagos State, winning the majority of votes in the capital city of Abuja and thrashingthe PDP in its traditional strongholds in the South South and South East geopolitical zones. Not even the most starry-eyedoptimists could have imagined that these scenarios were possible.  

The results in Lagos are worth considering in greater detail: In the presidential elections, the labour party got 582,454 votes while Tinubu’s APC managed to garner 572,606 votes. The nearly 10,000 votes margin with which Obi beat Tinubu in Lagos might have been a mere 1% of the total votes cast, but the symbolism of that victory is staggering. Lagos after all, was supposed to be Tinubu’s crowning glory. It was Lagos that turned the ex-Mobil Accountant into a powerhouse of Nigerian politics. It was Lagos that was his claim to fame. It was his governance of Lagos that shaped his political resume, filled his coffers, and propped him up as someone capable of leading a complex nation like Nigeria. Lagos was supposed to be his uncontested space. Yet when the dust settled, he had been beatenon his home turf by a party that had only managed to get 110 votes statewide in the 2019 presidential elections, and by a candidate who did not even call the state home. 

However, for those who might have imagined that Obi’s spectacular victory in Lagos on February 25th represented the stirrings of a new political movement, the results in the gubernatorial elections just two weeks later seriously challenged that assertion as the state fell back squarely into the laps of the APC. In the gubernatorial elections, the APC candidate obtained 762,134 votes while the Labour candidate obtained 312,329 votes. 270,125 voters had peeled away from the LP coalition within two weeks – representing about 46% of the coalition that had powered the LP to a narrow victory in Lagos just two weeks earlier. 

A coalition that falters within a two-week timeframe is a fragile one. That is not a disparaging remark – it is a statement of fact. If the Obi coalition of 2023 is to realize its full potential, we must be ready to take a hard-nosed, objective look at the set of facts before us. 

This discourse will be based on the results of the presidential and gubernatorial elections as presented by INEC. Since none of the top three vote getters in the presidential elections (APC, PDP and Labour) who were able to place agents across almost all of the polling units have come out with alternative polling numbers to contest the official tallies provided by INEC, the reportednumbers are the sole basis by which any objective analysis can be done. 

Slaying Monsters: Peter Obi’s Coalition Busts Myths

Peter Obi’s coalition dismantled two myths that have been perennially perpetuated about the Nigerian political system  – the need for structure, and the unyielding cynicism of the Nigerian voter that makes it unlikely that they would ever back a ‘dark horse” with  no real chance of victory. These myths have been central to how politics is played in Nigeria. Because of the centrality of these myths to how elections are won and lost in Nigeria, it is worth spending some time to really understand how and why they persisted for so long and appreciate the intensity and scale of the seismic shift that occurred in the 2023 elections. 

The Structure Myth

The structure myth explains why most people gravitate towards the large political parties. When Nigerians talk about structure, they are simply referring to irrefutable evidence that a political party has a national spread. Elections are won and lost in the 176,848 polling units spread across Nigeria’s 8,813 electoral wards and 774 local government areas. No party has ever won a presidential election in Nigeria that has not been able to place at least one-party agent in majority of the 176,848 polling units. The APC placed agents in 176,223 polling units (99.7% coverage), while the PDP was able to place agents in 176,588polling units (99.9% coverage). The party that placed the third highest number of agents in polling units in 2023 was the labour party with 134,874 polling agents (76% coverage). Not bad for a party that scored only 5,074 votes nationwide in 2019! 

Structure does matter – and what Peter Obi and the labour party demonstrated was that without billions of naira in payments to party agents, a party could still generate an army of values driven volunteers and supporters who are willing and able to serve as a bulwark against electoral malfeasance. 

Nigeria’s elections still leave much to be desired, but the sanest part of the process occurs in the polling units. On election day across all the polling units, voters line up, get accredited and then proceed to vote. The votes are counted and tallied in front of everyone present at the polling unit. Those familiar with the Nigerian electoral process will find voters waiting patiently,sometimes long into the night, to physically watch the tallying and counting of the votes. Party agents are required to witness the entire process and then sign off on the veracity of the counted votes. In most polling units, these results are then posted on the walls for all to see. So, if a party is unable to place an agent in a polling unit, its ability to even have a say in the veracity of the process that occurred at the polling unit is lost. 

The results at the polling units represent the most accurate count of election day results and a party with agents in each polling unit can provide an independent nationwide tally of election results. Rigging in all its forms – the falsification of vote tallies, the stuffing of ballot boxes and the switching of vote counts – usually occurs away from the polling unit at, or enroute to the 8,813 collation centers. If a party wishes to be immune from INEC’s shenanigans, its first line of defense would be to have its party agents provide polling unit level results that would be reported in real time. This strategy of real time reporting of election day results from polling units was used to great effect in the 2015 elections. 

A party with “structure” would have the means to place at least one agent in each polling unit. And any organization that can in fact achieve this feat is without a doubt one that has something close to a national presence. It would mean they are present inthe almost 180,000 polling units. Such widespread presence implies that such a party would have eyes and ears on the ground in every electoral ward and in every local government area, allowing the party to tap into valuable insights about the conditions on the ground in that location. Structure also has another function - if a party were to use financial inducements to voters as a tool, there would at least need to be people on the ground in each of the polling units that would be able to get these funds to the voters. 

All politics is local, and “structure” is the currency by which a party’s “grass roots” or local presence is measured. 

The myth that “dark horses” cannot win

Nigerians are a pragmatic, street savvy people with a penchant for understanding trends and a keen ability to spot winners.Their political experiences over the last two decades with leaders that have failed to deliver on their electrical promises has made them cynical. They know elections require that a voter give up an entire day for an exercise whose outcomes are very likely to lead to another four years of disappointment. However,for many Nigerians, especially those in the lower classes, the so-called masses or lumpenproletariat, sitting out elections is not an option. Choosing a leader is the one thing that provides them with a semblance of power and agency, in a life that is otherwise lived in deference to others. And in making their choice of who to vote for, they understand there is such a thing as momentum and that the most likely winners in what is essentially a contest of popularity are those who have boots on the ground, jingles on the radio, posters on billboards and advertisements on TV.  There is a saying that “Naija no dey carry last”. Nigerians like to be on the winning team! No one wants to bet on the wrong horse. And so, for the last 24 years, Nigerians have cast majority of their votes for one of two major parties – the PDP and the APC (or its predecessor parties). The odds of picking a winner when you narrow your choices to just two contenders are a salutary 50%!

In 2019, I was one of the conveners of the Take It Back (TIB)Movement and co-founder of the African Action Congress along with Omoyele Sowore. I had a front seat to how the 2019 elections played out and saw this cynical pragmatism play out in real time.  As Director General of the Sowore 2019 campaign, I leaned heavily on technology and survey data to help shape our strategy. We took poll after poll of Nigerians across the country, and these potential voters would tell us in no uncertain terms in these surveys that they believed Atiku (the PDP presidential candidate) was a thief, and that Buhari (the APC presidential candidate) had failed the nation. Yet these two men topped those same polls – the same Nigerians telling us they were corrupt and inept were also willfully choosing them as their leaders. Nigerians were informing us in clear terms that they preferred the devils they knew to the angels they did not know. They would express unbridled admiration for the young, dynamic and impressive class of candidates that had emerged in the 2019 electoral cycle – Omoyele Sowore, Kingsley Moghalu, Fela Durotoye, Donald Duke, Oby Ezekwesili and others, but clearly indicate they would not vote for them. These “young candidates” were always a second or third choice for the average voter. When we forced the people we polled to put their logic of willfully choosing to vote for “thieves” and “failures” to words, majority made no pretenses and simply said they did not want to “waste” their vote. If elections are an all-day affair with uncertain outcomes, one might as well make a selection that is likely to produce a winner and provide a sense of euphoria  – if only for one night!

Many of Obi’s supporters went to the polls understanding that their votes might not count, aware that they did not have the structural advantages of the major parties, and conscious of the fact that they would likely be “wasting” their votes. Despite these enormous odds, these voters trooped out in their millionsto cast their votes and in that principled action, have charted a course that makes Nigeria’s path forward a lot clearer. “Naija no dey carry last”, but we also “no gree for anybody”. Dark horses can in fact win in Nigerian elections.

Obi’s Fragile Coalition

The Obi coalition was made up of four (4) disparate groups – a change platform made up of mostly youth and professionals who were passionate for a new kind of politics, southern PDP supporters who had become incensed by Atiku’s capture of a party ticket that they felt ought to have gone to a southern candidate, Christians who felt insulted by Tinubu’s selection of a northern Muslim as his VP candidate, and a tribal core of South Eastern Igbo supporters who saw in Peter Obi the most viable candidate for president from that region probably since Nigerian independence. 

Many of the young change seekers  had participated in or supported the EndSars protests of October 2020 and came to the coalition as veterans of social media driven political activism and mobilization. The southern PDP stalwarts who felt insulted by Atiku’s disregard for the zoning principle brought a practicalelement to the campaign effort – the understanding that agents are needed, and that on the ground campaigning was essential. The Christian protagonists who came to the coalition brought a certain religious zeal and broad appeal to the campaign that penetrated places in the far north that would otherwise have been unreachable. Peter Obi did not create a movement in 2023. He managed a fragile coalition of groups that saw in him a vehicle for the realization of their aspirations, and it is to his credit that he was able to hold that broad alliance of people with disparate interests together to pull off one of the most spectacular feats in Nigerian political history. 

We have been able to put some numbers to the makeup of this coalition using a national survey that ran from the last week in December 2023 through the first two weeks in January 2024. 1,163 respondents were asked to select from a list of optionswhat they believed was responsible for the strong performance of Peter Obi and the labour party in the 2023 presidential elections. Of those who supported Peter Obi’s presidential bid, 31% ascribed his strong showing to the support of the youth and EndSars activists, 53% attributed it to those who wanted a change from the PDP and APC, 6.5% credited it to support from southerners who were upset that the PDP had not respected the principle of zoning in selecting Atiku for the presidential ticket, 14% believed it was due to protest votes against APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket,  3% ascribed it to support for the labour party, while 51% ascribed their choice to the quality of the candidate.Respondents were allowed to select as many options as they believed to be relevant. These results reflect the breath of reasons that brought Obi’s supporters into his coalition. 

There are critical differences between a coalition and a movement. A coalition retains its factional interests, and when those are no longer served, their support is withdrawn. If Peter Obi had created a movement, we would not have seen such a withering erosion of support for the Labour party within two short weeks between the presidential elections of 25th February and the gubernatorial elections of March 11th. The Labour party swung from having 6,101,533 votes in the presidential election to just 600,374 votes across all of the gubernatorial elections that its candidates participated in – a 90% erosion of support, nationwide. In the same gubernatorial elections, the APC and PDP vote tallies increased by 11% and 5% respectively, compared to the numbers both parties recorded in the presidential elections. There was a similar erosion of 46% in the votes the labour party garnered in Lagos in the fortnight between the presidential and gubernatorial elections. The APC went from an almost 10,000 vote loss in the presidential election to a 450,000 vote margin of victory in the gubernatorial elections within just two weeks. 

By definition, a movement is a single entity, that has been forged around common goals. It is an organic whole that cannot be peeled away easily. It is not an amalgam of interest groups, since those retain the properties of their composite elements. A movement is instead more like an alloy, an entirely new substance that combines the best characteristics of its composite elements to make something better, stronger and more valuable than the sum of its parts. It is in Nigeria’s interest that the Obi coalition does not falter, and that it successfully transforms into a movement that can continue to viably contest for the very soul of Nigeria. To understand how the transformation from coalition to movement can happen, we must question why the Obi coalition came apart so quickly and so easily in the one place where it recorded its most spectacular victory – Lagos. 

A coalition falters: The Case of Lagos

The case of Lagos is worth leaning into because it is particularly instructive, and the messy details of how this reversal in the fortunes of the Labour party occurred there offers valuable lessons in the delicate task of coalition management that Peter Obi must engage in if he is to turn his political machine into a true movement.  Ethnicity was the main reason for the fracture of the coalition in Lagos State. The two-week period between the presidential elections of 25th February and the gubernatorial elections of March 11th, saw a vitriolic back and forth between some supporters of the Labour Party and APC that was centered mostly around ethnicity, devolving into debates about the “ownership” of Lagos and derailed the campaign from being about any substantive differences the candidates would make in the lives of every day Lagosians. People who had been allies on the Obi coalition just two weeks before were at daggers drawn, a fortnight later. 

What the Peter Obi coalition lost in the Lagos gubernatorial election and across much of the South West geopolitical zone, was a group of youth and professionals who either became neutrals or went back into their ethnic corners because they were put off by the ethnic coloration that the political discourse had taken. What attracted them to Obi was a desire for change – and his iconoclastic style. His seeming command of the details of what it would take to transform Nigeria was refreshing. They were attracted by his ability to have been a part of the political system for so long, and yet somehow remain unchanged by it. For Obi was after all, the vice president on the Atiku ticket in 2019 and a two-term governor of Anambra State.  These people were seeking for change, and the ethnic debates that the Lagos gubernatorial elections had devolved into sounded too much like the politics of old. And so in the case of Lagos, three (3) parts of the coalition were peeled off – the young change seekers who were put off by the ethnic colouration the elections had taken, the absence of a potent Atiku induced southern aggrievement factor in the gubernatorial race, and the absence of a potentreligious grievance – as both the LP and APC gubernatorial candidates were Christians. 

Four (4) steps to Birthing a Movement.

From the outside looking in, it would appear that what the Peter Obi coalition has relied on to forge some sense of common purpose after the elections has been the post-election fight in the courts. Peter Obi has also declared that the Labour party will serve as the “opposition party” in 2024. A movement cannot be built solely in opposition, but through concerted and focused action. A movement must not only stand against something, it must stand for something. What has not been articulated is how the coalition will be strengthened, how its ranks can be expanded and more importantly how its transformation to a true movement would occur. The battle for the presidency in 2023might have been lost, but there is now a larger war for the soul of Nigeria that can still be won. A movement must know how to fight but above all it must understand how to build. Here are four suggestions for what the Obi coalition can do to build on the remarkable promise of February 25th, 2023 and transform to a true movement. 

1. The Movement Must Always Come Before the Party: Prior to Obi’s entry into the labour party, it was not a serious factor in Nigerian politics. Although it was formed in 2002and on paper claims to represent the interests of Nigeria’s workers, it managed to get just 5,074 votes nationwide in 2019, with a paltry 110 of those votes coming from Lagosstate. The messy factional fights that have broken out since Obi took the party’s presidential ticket have been disgraceful, and they will likely worsen due to the significantly enhanced status of the Labour party and the inevitable influx of opportunists that will occur. A movement must not tie its fortunes to any single party that it did not establish for severalreasons. The first is that those who support a movement might legitimately have an interest in other political party platforms. The second is that political parties are extremely vulnerable to being overrun by opportunists and carpet baggers with the attendant risk that what the party does is at odds with what the movement says. We are already seeing that in the conduct of the labour party contingent at the national assembly. The reality is that Peter Obi could have obtained his 6 million plus votes on the platform of any of the other 15 political parties not called APC or PDP.  Afterall, when he was not on the ballot, the Labour party drew just 600,000 votes just two weeks after polling over 6 million votes nationwide. The factis that the coalition that supported Obi neither knows nor cares for the ideological leanings of the labour party. As previously noted, in the latest instalment of a monthly national poll undertaken by the Governance Advancement Initiative for Nigerian (GAIN), only 3% of those who supported Peter Obi in the presidential election indicated that they did so because they were supporters of the labour party – the lowest of the various reasons his supporters gave for becoming part of his coalition. In the same survey, 52% of respondents who supported Peter Obi in the presidential elections, indicated that they voted for a candidate from a party other than  Labour in the gubernatorial elections.  A movement must keep its powder dry and remain unaffiliated  with any political party so that it can maintain a broad coalition in its formative period. Part of what the movement should figure out as it defines itself and grows in strength and unity is whether its interests are best serviced by joining with an existing political party or forming something completely new that is more in line with its beliefs and aspirations. There is also the sad reality that the Labour party’s delegation to the national assembly which is comprised of people who rode the coattails of Obi’s performance in the presidential elections to victory, have not distinguished themselves in any way from their APC and PDP colleagues. A fledging movement must not allow itself to be mired by the actions or behaviors of party officials whose actions do not reflect its values. 

2. Build around unifying themes: Peter Obi must find a way to turn a fragile coalition of change agents, disillusioned PDP stalwarts, ethnic supporters and religious balance advocates who supported him in 2023 into one cohesive team. While these groups might have different issues that attracted them to Peter Obi, they are all united by a few factors – a desire to see Nigeria progress, a belief that a group of citizens without access to “political structure”, state resources or wealthy godfathers can effect deep systemic change; and a vocal and stubborn commitment to their cause. The movement that emerges from this coalition must learn from the missteps in Lagos state. These shared objectives can be the platform on which a unified movement can be built. 

3. Leverage technology and programs to build a participatory and communal spirit: A movement is birthed in common action and unified purpose.  A movement that relies only on elections to impassion its people and put them to work is doomed to fail. This is a transactional approach to organising that is short sighted and ineffective. Movements should develop programs around the core things that its members care about. In recent national polls respondents who self-identify as supporters of Peter Obi ranked security as the first issue of concern, followed by Economic opportunities and Job growth. A movement seeking to build consensus and common purpose could develop programs around these areasof interest. The movement could for instance set up teams of supporters who would identify communities, schools, and marketplaces that suffer from a lack of amenities. They could raise funds to provide solar power to such communities addressing an energy issue that has plagued Nigeria for decades, whilst also helping to use the availability of light to reduce security concerns and to enhance economic activities. The movement could put its vast team of professionals to work as volunteers, providing instruction on economic empowerment that will assist the beneficiaries in meeting their basic needs. The movement could use technology to help ease financial access problems for its members. A movement must demonstrate in its own small way, that it can marshal resources to do those things that governments have failed to do. Through these activities and many more, a movement builds common purpose, identifies dependable leaders within its ranks, and begins to demonstrate to the people that change is indeed possible. Nigerians being the pragmatic people that they are, would recognize that a movement that is able to direct its own resources towards the selfless empowerment of the Nigerian people, would once in power likely direct state resources towards the growth and rebuilding of the Nigerian state. 

4. Go Grass Roots: A serious political movement must have a nationwide presence with representation in all the 774 local government areas, as well as dependable stalwarts in each of the 8,813 electoral wards and 176,848 polling units in the country. It is this army of supporters, spread across all of Nigeria that will carry the transformational message of the movement into each household and across all the nooks and crannies of the nation. It appears that the Peter Obi coalition had a presence in about 76% of Nigeria, as it was able to place Labour party agents in 134,874 of 176,848 polling units in the country during the presidential elections. The major parties as expected fielded agents nationwide with the APC and PDP placing 176,223 (99.7% coverage) and 176,588 (99.9% coverage) agents respectively. It must be emphasized that while placing agents in polling units is not the same thing as having a grass roots presence, in referencing these numbers the point being made is simply that Peter Obi’s support base was broad and can and should be leveraged to build a nationwide grassroots movement. Technology can also play a role in helping to shape and build a grassroots movement. PVC cards have a unique individualized number that identifies the state, local government, electoral ward and polling unit of the card holder. By starting with the development of a database of the 2023 supporters of Peter Obi, a picture of their national spread can be determined and used as a platform for growing grass roots support. All politics is local, and having a grass roots base will enable the movement to create programs that are locally relevant and topical. 

Peter Obi currently bears the mantle of change in Nigeria. Those who want to see the nation fulfil its immense potential must recognise that Nigeria’s path to greatness requires a new kind of politics. Nothing will change in Nigeria unless there is a coordinated and consolidated way in which all of the various forces that wish Nigeria well are harnessed into one powerful force. 83% of those who supported Peter Obi in the 2023 Presidential elections indicated that they would continue to support the “Obidient movement” in future presidentialelections. Mr. Obi just needs to make sure there is actually a movement for them to support when that time comes. 

About the Author: 

Dr Malcolm Fabiyi is the President of the Governance Advancement Initiative for Nigeria (GAIN), a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) committed to the enhancement of good governance in Nigeria. He writes extensively on the Nigerian condition and was one time Student Union President at the University of Lagos during the Abacha regime. He is a co-founder of the African Action Congress, one of the 18 registered political parties.  Dr Fabiyi is the author of the book “My Mind on Nigeria”. 

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