LABOUR PARTY CRISIS: Supreme Court Judgement Offers the NLC and TUC Opportunity to Take Over Party Leadership

Press Statement by the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM)

Despite the fact that the Supreme Court on April 4 nullified the Court of Appeal’s judgment, which had recognised Julius Abure as the national chairman of the Labour Party, the leadership crisis has not been conclusively resolved. Abure, apparently akin to kicks of a dying horse, is still laying claim to the continued leadership of the party while the Nenadi Usman led caretaker committee has asserted that they are now in control by the virtue of the apex court’s verdict. Essentially, the party is currently in limbo. It appears that it is the faction which the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) recognizes that wins the battle for the soul of the party.

At present this battle in the Labour Party appears the same as the sometimes vicious struggles for control, nominations etc. that repeatedly break out in most Nigerian political parties. But potentially the Labour Party could be a different party as its roots in the trade unions have given it the possibility of becoming a party of the working class, the poor and those who want to sweep away the rotten, corrupt capitalist system. However, this would only be possible if it becomes a democratically run membership-based party, with no selling of nomination forms etc., that adopts a programme of a socialist transformation of Nigeria.

Unfortunately, the leadership of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) who had earlier given an indication that they were prepared to also throw their hat in the ring over the party leadership vacuum and begin to change the party, now appears to have chickened out. It should be recalled that the NLC had in a statement, issued on April 8 and signed by its President Joe Ajaero, correctly said: “To resolve the leadership vacuum in the Labour Party, the surviving institutional members of the LP National Executive Committee (NEC) are expected to appoint an interim leadership which will conduct an inclusive Special National Convention for the party in line with the provisions of the LP Constitution and the consent judgement. Any step outside these constitutional procedures will be an affront to the rule of law and would be tantamount to an unmitigable assault on constitutional rule. Such mischief will be stoutly resisted by Nigerian workers and people”.

By the Constitution of the party the institutional members of the NEC are the respective President, General Secretary and Chair, Women Commission of the NLC and Trade Union Congress (TUC). But instead of the NLC leadership to setting a process in motion to give effect to the way out they have articulated, it appears they have lined themselves behind the Usman ‘caretaker committee’ as the NLC and its Political Commission were represented at the meeting of this faction on April 9.

We hold if the NLC leadership are serious about recovering and repositioning “the party as the vehicle for the emancipation of the Nigerian masses” as they stated in the said statement, the Supreme Court judgement offers for now the best opportunity. While Abia State Governor Alex Otti, who together with Peter Obi initiated the formation of the ‘caretaker committee’, is an automatic member of the NEC, the Labour representatives are in the vast majority. Besides, given the commitment of Nenadi Usman, a former Finance Minister under Olusegun Obasanjo, Otti and Obi to the basics of the neo-liberal capitalist programme which accounts for the current monumental cost of living crisis and economic disaster under the Bola Tinubu government, it is not possible for the ‘caretaker committee’ to reposition “the party as the vehicle for the emancipation of the Nigerian masses”. This is an important lesson the NLC leadership should have learned from their uncritical support in the 2023 presidential election for Peter Obi who advocated basically the same economic policies Tinubu has been implementing since he assumed office. In other words, while the exit of Abure should be music to the ears of the Nigerian masses, the alternative offered by the Usman committee is not a genuine one for them.

Therefore, we urge the leaderships of both the NLC and TUC to work together and initiate the process of taking over the leadership of the party as already articulated in the NLC statement. However, there is need for a discussion within the labour and left movement on the programme as well as organisational and political methods through which the party can be truly repositioned “as the vehicle for the emancipation of the Nigerian masses”. We therefore reiterate our call for a special conference that involves trade unions, socialist and left organisations, left coalitions like JAF, CORE, ASCAB, etc to have a deliberation in this regard.

Nonetheless, if the NLC and TUC leaderships refuse to seek to take over the party leadership and it is the pro-Obi ‘caretaker committee’ which is recognized by the INEC, as we stated in a previous statement, we will not argue for socialists and left activists to immediately leave the party. However, it will be wrong for socialists and activists to be silent or uncritical if Obi or anybody is using the platform of the party to advocate pro-capitalist programmes. At the same time, socialists and activists must also resist monetization politics and policy which deprive working class elements the opportunity of standing as candidates of the party in an election and argue that Nigeria needs a democratically based mass workers’ party on a socialist programme.

By and large, for us in the Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM), working people need their own corruption free and democratically run party, whatever name it is called, which consistently mobilises for mass action to resist all anti-poor capitalist policies and ultimately fights to end capitalism and for the enthronement of a socialist future.

Peluola Adewale

National Organising Secretary

For Democratic Socialist Movement (DSM)