Political parties matter. They organise people around ideas. They provide platforms upon which candidates seek the
confidence of the electorate. They aggregate interests, develop policies, contest elections, and, when successful, provide the political machinery through which men and women are elected to public office. But a political party is still a means to an end.
The party is not the purpose. The people are.
That distinction matters because somewhere along the way, political loyalty can become confused with public service. We begin to behave as though loyalty to party is itself the highest political virtue; as though the interests of the party must always prevail, regardless of whether those interests coincide with the interests of the people. I do not believe that they must.
A political party exists to provide a platform through which people can be elected to serve society. It follows, therefore, that when the interests of a political party come into direct conflict with the welfare of the people it exists to serve, the people must prevail. For me, that principle is clear. We are citizens before we are members of political parties.
Our membership cards cannot supersede our citizenship.
This does not mean that party loyalty is unimportant. Political organisations cannot function without discipline,
collective responsibility, compromise, and a reasonable degree of loyalty among their members.
People join parties
because, presumably, they share sufficient values and political objectives to work together towards a common purpose.
There will be disagreements. There will be compromises. There will be occasions when one’s preferred position does
not carry the day. Politics, like most collective human endeavours, requires the maturity to accept that we will not always get everything we want. But compromise has limits.
There is a difference between accepting that my preferred policy has not prevailed and being required to support
something that I genuinely believe will harm the people I entered politics to serve. At that point, the question becomes one of conscience. If a policy being pursued by my political party is demonstrably detrimental to the lives of the people I represent, should I support it simply because it is the position of my party? I believe the answer must
be no. Not because I have suddenly become disloyal to my party, but because there is a higher loyalty involved:
loyalty to the purpose for which political parties themselves exist.
Service.
This distinction becomes particularly important once elections are over. During an election, parties necessarily
compete. They distinguish themselves from one another. They ask citizens to choose between different candidates, ideas, and programmes. But government cannot operate indefinitely as though the election campaign never ended.
Once elected, public officials acquire responsibilities that extend beyond party structures. The legislator represents
constituents who voted for him or her and constituents who did not. The governor governs members of his or her
party, members of the opposition, members of no political party at all, and citizens who may have actively campaigned against him or her. Public office changes the nature of the responsibility.
The question can no longer simply be, what does my party want? It must also be, and more importantly, what do the people need? This is where political maturity becomes important. If another political party proposes a good idea, the idea does not become bad simply because of its origin. If an administration from another party introduces a policy that demonstrably improves people’s lives, acknowledging that success does not diminish one’s own political identity.
Similarly, if one’s own party gets something wrong, recognising the error should not automatically constitute betrayal.
We must be capable of separating the merits of an idea from the colour of the flag under which it was proposed.
Otherwise, politics becomes tribal rather than deliberative. And progress suffers. This is something we must confront
head on in the Nigerian context – the cost of discontinuity – when laudable projects and policies are abandoned simply because of changes in government.
There is also a more difficult question: when should a politician speak? Politics requires strategy. I do not believe wisdom requires a person to express every disagreement at every moment, in every forum, regardless of
consequence. There are times to argue privately. Times to persuade internally. Times to build consensus.
Times to wait. And there may even be occasions when strategic restraint today allows someone to acquire the influence
necessary to achieve considerably more tomorrow. Silence, therefore, is not automatically cowardice.
But we should be honest about why we are silent. If I exercise restraint because I genuinely believe I can achieve a
better outcome for the people by doing so, that is strategy. If I remain silent simply because speaking might damage my political advancement, cost me an appointment, threaten my access to power, or inconvenience those whose
favour I need, that is something very different. The distinction lies in who ultimately benefits from my silence. If the
answer is principally me, then I should have the courage to interrogate my motives.
Political ambition is not inherently wrong. One must attain a position of influence before one can exercise that
influence. But ambition becomes dangerous when the pursuit of office gradually replaces the purpose for which the
office was sought. A person can spend so long manoeuvring towards power that, somewhere along the journey, they
forget what they intended to do with it.
That is why values matter. There must be principles that survive political convenience. For me, one of those principles
is straightforward: if the actions of a political party of which I am a member would cause genuine detriment to the lives of citizens, I cannot support those actions merely because they carry my party’s name. That would conflict with my own understanding of public service and with the values of service to humanity that I inherited from my father’s example. This should not be controversial.
Indeed, strong political parties ought to welcome principled internal disagreement. A party in which nobody can challenge an idea is not necessarily united. It may simply have stopped thinking. A party in which loyalty is measured entirely by obedience risks surrounding its leadership with people who tell it what it wants to hear rather than what it needs to know. And ultimately, that does the party itself no favours.
Constructive dissent can strengthen an institution. It can identify mistakes before they become crises. It can force
policies to withstand scrutiny. It can expose assumptions. It can ensure that the voices of citizens reach decisionmakers
even when those voices are inconvenient.
Loyalty should therefore never require the abandonment of judgement. Nor should political affiliation require
intellectual blindness. I can believe deeply in my political party and still recognise wisdom elsewhere. I can defend its
principles without pretending it is incapable of error. I can work for its success without believing that its success is
more important than Nigeria’s. Indeed, if I genuinely believe in my party, I should want it to be held to a standard high
enough to deserve the confidence it seeks from the people. That is a more demanding form of loyalty.
But I believe it is also a more valuable one. Nigeria needs political parties. Our democracy cannot function effectively
without strong institutions capable of organising political participation, developing ideas, recruiting candidates, and
providing voters with meaningful choices.
But those institutions must always remember why they exist. Not for themselves. Not merely to win elections. Not
simply to acquire and retain power. They exist because politics provides a mechanism through which citizens entrust
people with the authority to serve. And that creates a hierarchy of responsibility that should never become confused.
Country before party.
Citizens before political machinery.
Service before ambition.
Progress before partisanship.
There will inevitably be moments when those loyalties are tested. Those moments tell us something important about
why we entered politics in the first place. For me, the line is clear. I will be loyal to my party. I will work within it, contribute to it, defend what I believe is right within it, and do my part to help it succeed. But political loyalty must never require disloyalty to the people. Because ultimately, the party is the platform, and the people are the purpose.
Ayobami Akinyode OLUNLOYO is the PDP Candidate for Oyo Senatorial District
#Olunloyo #AAOforSenate #OmoBaba2027 #ItIsTimeForADifference
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