NDC Makes Obi, Kwankwaso Swear to Anti-Defection Pact
The Nigeria Democratic Congress has rolled out a binding anti-defection regime that compels every candidate seeking elective office on its platform to sign indemnity forms and swear affidavits surrendering their mandates if they abandon the party after winning.
The party’s National Chairman, Senator Moses Cleopas Zuwoghe, unveiled the policy on Tuesday at an indemnity signing ceremony at the NDC national secretariat in Abuja. He said the rule will apply to candidates contesting presidential, governorship, National Assembly and other elective positions under the platform. That sweep means the party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, and his running mate, Rabiu Kwankwaso, fall within its reach ahead of the 2027 general elections.
Zuwoghe framed the measure as a defence of voters’ choices rather than a witch-hunt.
“The mandate belongs to the party and the people who voted through that platform. If you leave the party after winning, you cannot continue to hold the seat,” he said.
He added that any official who exits “must also surrender the mandate obtained through the party.”
The chairman said the NDC was built as a lasting institution, not a temporary vehicle for personal ambition, and that the party studied successful democratic systems before adopting structures to protect ideology, loyalty and continuity. He cited the Labour Party’s experience after the 2023 elections, arguing that defections by elected officials had weakened the party.
Providing the legal basis, the party’s National Legal Adviser, Reuben Egwuaba, argued that electoral victories are fundamentally tied to political parties, describing parties as voluntary associations governed by rules their members accept.
The policy lands against a backdrop of relentless party-switching. Between February 2024 and February 2025, there were about 300 political defections, with the internal crisis clause serving as the major excuse most defectors tendered to the House. As recently as October 2025, six lawmakers from the PDP and Labour Party crossed to the ruling All Progressives Congress in a single plenary, citing factional disputes in their former parties.
Nigeria’s constitution already addresses the question, but enforcement has proved elusive. Section 68(1)(g) and its state equivalent, Section 109(1)(g), require a legislator who defects to vacate the seat, except where the move results from a division within the party or a merger. Courts have historically applied the clause with flexibility, often ruling in favour of defectors by accepting claims of party crisis as justification. Legal commentators note that a 2024 Supreme Court decision further narrowed proof of defection, weakening the deterrent.
Whether the NDC’s affidavits can succeed where the constitution has faltered remains contested. The provision binds only legislators, leaving executive defectors largely untouched, and courts may still test whether private indemnity pledges can override a seat conferred by electoral law.
The NDC itself has grown through the same realignment it now seeks to curb. The party, founded in February 2026 by Senator Henry Seriake Dickson after a split from the African Democratic Congress, has absorbed several recent entrants, including former Adamawa governorship candidate Aishatu Binani. It currently holds 17 House seats and three in the Senate.
Meanwhile, the party’s primaries remain slated for nationwide conduct, positioning the affidavit rule as the first compliance test for its 2027 hopefuls.