BY AHMED AKANBI
The National Chairman of the Labour Party (LP), Senator Nenadi Usman, has said Nigeria’s democracy is still in place today because of the sacrifices made by former President Goodluck Jonathan.
Usman, according to a statement by the party’s spokesperson, Ken Asogwa, spoke to journalists in Bauchi on Tuesday on the sidelines of the 2026 Goodluck Jonathan Foundation Democracy Dialogue, where she urged Nigerian politicians to emulate the non-violent approach to politics associated with the former President.
She argued that Nigeria’s democracy survived the doomsday predictions of 2015 because Jonathan conceded defeat even before final votes were tallied.
According to her, such a principled approach had never been witnessed on the Nigerian political horizon.
“From the inception of his presidency, he consistently maintained that neither his election nor remaining in power was worth the blood of any Nigerian, and on the day that this oft-repeated refrain was put to the test, the former President lived up to his preaching,” she said.
Usman implored politicians angling for the presidency in 2027 to play according to the rules.
She quoted American investor Warren Buffett, saying: “Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago,” stressing that the democracy Nigerians enjoy today survived because Jonathan made sacrifices in the past.
The Chairman then questioned whether any of the present-day presidential candidates would be capable of making such sacrifices given the level of inflammatory rhetoric in political camps.
On the LP’s readiness for 2027, Usman said the party is the most structured political party in Nigeria going into the next general elections.
She maintained that with the combined strength of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC and Trade Union Congress, TUC, both constitutional members of the party, no Nigerian political party is better positioned to “show the All Progressives Congress, APC government the exit door than the Labour Party.”
She enjoined all political parties seeking a coalition to collapse and subsume their structures into the Labour Party, saying it remains the only opposition party with a realistic presence in the 186,000 polling stations across the country.
The 2026 Democracy Dialogue, themed “Beyond Elections: Can Political Parties and the Judiciary Save African Democracy?”, attracted dignitaries including former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan, former Vice President Namadi Sambo, Governor Bala Mohammed, Peter Obi, and other leaders.