The Peers Advocacy and Advancement Centre (PAACA), a Civil Society Organisation (CSO), has urged politicians to cease the practice of switching political parties, known as carpet crossing, to preserve the important role of opposition in democratic governance.
Ezenwa Nwagwu, the Executive Director of PAACA, stressed this point during an interview with journalists in Abuja on Saturday.
According to Nwagwu, politicians avoid facing opposition from media and civil society groups by switching to a different political party when their goals are not achieved.
“Nigerian politicians have no interest in opposition, their opposition is in writing statements,” he said.
“The work of the civil society and the media is not to oppose the government but to clap when the government does well and criticise when they should. But they now want us to play their own role.
“And that is why we need to do something about this movement from one political party to another. They are outsourcing the opposition.
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”That is why when they see us, they say you people are not talking enough, forgetting that the only reason civil societies talked under military rule in the past was because there were no political parties then,” he said.
Mr Ezenwa said that opposition political parties were meant to be shadow governments, through policy differentiation.
“The Republican Party and the Democratic Party of the United States of America do not speak the same language; when they want to speak the same language, they come into a conference.
“The Labour Party and the Conservative Party of the United Kingdom do not speak the same language.
“Opposition is a policy; what is your policy in agriculture, in education and health? So, if I compare with the PDP or the APC, then I can make a choice.
“The only difference here is the style of accomplishing those tasks. Opposition is not fashionable to the Nigerian politician.
“Where does it leave the Nigerian people? They are being deceived and aided by a very uninformed populace that do not take the time to differentiate between what is concrete and what is not,” Mr Nwagwu said.
He therefore, said it was necessary to do something to discourage or kill cross carpeting, to ensure Nigeria’s democracy and Nigerians enjoy viable opposition.
