APDA: Advanced PDP, a pass to APGA or a clash with AD?

by Alexander O. Onukwue

It may have escaped your notice but APDA is the second ‘Advanced’ political party in Nigeria, following the Advanced Congress of Democrats (ACD).

The new party, which boasts persons like Dan Iwuanyanwu and Raymond Dokpesi as members/sympathisers, was officially registered with the INEC on June 07, 2017. It is a development that is generating reactions, especially within the ranks of the PDP which has served as the primary academy for the new party.

Deep in a long-running leadership crisis, the PDP, which produced the overwhelming majority of Nigeria’s leaders between 1999 and 2014, is yet to recover from the bruising defeats in the 2015 elections, and the inability to resolve the Makarfi-Sheriff stalemate has seen many who want to be relevant in 2019 adopt available alternatives.

From the statements at its unveiling ceremony, APDA wants to be recognised as a different party from its parent: reserved slots for women, rotational Chairmanship and all that. But, on closer inspection here is a brief analysis of APDA:

How far can the APDA advance from PDP?

In terms of ideology and a manifesto, how different can we expect the APDA to be from PDP? For starters, it very much appeared that the presence of ‘sympathisers’ from the PDP was required to give the unveiling of the Party the element of grandeur. The interim National Chairman of the Party suggested that they await more persons from other parties (read PDP) to join them with time, and when they do, will they be coming with anything more than what they already are used to?

A New Party to lure the South-East?

For a period lasting until the 2015 elections, Dan Iwuanyanwu earned considerable following as a ‘neutral’ voice in Nigerian politics. He was the leader of the Labour Party, whose only political public official of note was Olusegun Mimiko of Ondo state. With Mimiko’s move to the PDP, Iwuanyanwu also relinquished his role in Labour but did not seek cover under the umbrella. Now part of a new movement where he is likely going to have more reach, is he looking to endear South-Easterners to join a more National-looking party? The use of ‘Alliance’ as the last word in the name of the party is surely more than a coincidence, given that the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA) are more South-Eastern parties.

Will they not clash with the AD?

There are reports that the new party should be questioned for adopting the logo of one of the popular brands in the brewing industry. There is not much of a case in that, but the APDA insignia has another quirk: the ‘P’ and ‘A’ are formatted in white, making the ‘A’ and ‘D’ the only alphabets that can be recognised from a distance. They may want to look at it again.

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