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Political Coalitions and Democratic Consolidation in a Fragmented Polity: The Nigerian Experience
Abstract
The paper investigated political coalitions and democratic consolidation in a fragmented
polity with reference to Nigeria. Political coalitions in Nigeria’s fragmented polity play a
pivotal role in shaping democratic consolidation, reflecting the country’s complex socio
political dynamics. The objective of the study is to identify the forms and drivers political
coalitions in Nigeria; and to examine implications of political coalitions on democratic
consolidation in Nigeria’s fragmented democracy. The study made use of the
Consociationalism theory as its theoretical framework, adopted the descriptive research
design, relied heavy on secondary data, and analyzed the collected data via the content
method of data analysis. The findings of the study revealed that the forms of political
coalitions in Nigeria include - pre-election coalitions, post-election coalitions, party mergers,
and informal alliances. Other forms are Minimal Winning Coalitions, Minimal Connected
Winning Coalitions (MCW); Oversized or Surplus Coalitions, and Minority Coalitions. The
key drivers of political coalitions include the type of the political regime in power, the type of
electoral system in practice, avoidance of waste of votes, the legal framework governing
political parties, party alliances and coalitions, ethno-linguistic and regional factors, financial
security factor, party ideologies and classes, ethnic and regional balancing, electoral
incentives, countering incumbent dominance, office-seeking motives, socio-economic and
security crises; while their implications on democratic consolidation are both positive and
negative. The study therefore recommended among others that the making of reforms such as
legal frameworks for political coalition agreements, placing emphasis on policy-driven
alliances with the intent to enhance Nigeria’s democratic stability, promote electoral
competition, inclusivity and representation, policy continuity, enhancing electoral
competition, stabilizing political transitions.
