Judicialising party primaries : contemporary developments in Nigeria

dc.contributor.authorIhembe, Martin Ayankaa
dc.contributor.authorIsike, Christopher
dc.date.accessioned2024-07-05T04:35:04Z
dc.date.available2024-07-05T04:35:04Z
dc.date.issued2022-06
dc.description.abstractThis article explores the judicialisation of party primaries in contemporary Nigeria, which is a defining feature of the country’s electoral politics. Since the inception of the Fourth Republic, the lack of internal democracy within the parties has been the source of protracted crises during nomination, and this often gravitates to the serenity of the court(s). Dominant disquisitions in legal theory contend that disputed primaries are internal party affairs; hence, they are non-justiciable. Drawing on primary and secondary data – YouTube interviews, the Constitution, the Electoral Act, judicial ruling, media reports, and personal observation – this article argues that to the extent that political parties are juridical entities, disputed primary elections are justiciable, hence a legal question to be resolved by the judiciary. To validate our argument, the article draws on Raphael’s (1970) notion of universal and compulsory jurisdiction. Our enquiry reveals that the failure of the internal mechanisms of the parties to resolve disputed party primaries accounts for aggrieved aspirants’ reliance on legal redress. While this approach has been questioned from a legalistic point of view, the constitutionality of seeking legal redress has its provenance in the change of legal regime regulating party primaries, which has shaped, reshaped, and positively impacted electoral democracy in Nigeria.en_US
dc.description.departmentPolitical Sciencesen_US
dc.description.librarianhj2024en_US
dc.description.sdgSDG-16:Peace,justice and strong institutionsen_US
dc.description.urihttps://www.eisa.org/publications/jaeen_US
dc.identifier.citationIhembe, M.A. & Isike, C. 2022, 'Judicialising party primaries: contemporary developments in Nigeria', Journal of African Elections, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 24-43, doi : 10.20940/JAE/2022/v21i1a2.en_US
dc.identifier.issn1609-4700
dc.identifier.other10.20940/JAE/2022/v21i1a2
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2263/96808
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherElectoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africaen_US
dc.rightsArticle is published under a Creative Commons licence CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.en_US
dc.subjectDisputed primariesen_US
dc.subjectJusticiableen_US
dc.subjectJudiciaryen_US
dc.subjectNigeriaen_US
dc.subjectConstitutionen_US
dc.subjectSDG-16: Peace, justice and strong institutionsen_US
dc.titleJudicialising party primaries : contemporary developments in Nigeriaen_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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