Party Dominance and Democracy in Nigeria: A Study of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (1999 – 2007)

The emergence of dominant parties in the new democracies of developing
countries is an impediment to the development and sustenance of democracy. Although the general argument in literature is that party dominance is an anomaly, different explanations are offered for this anomaly in different countries. While there exists mass of literature on the new democracies of South Africa, India, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Alberta among others, there is an obvious dearth of such literature on Nigeria's party system. This study sought to find an explanation to the dominance of the PeopIes' Democratic Party (PDP) since 1999, in the face of proliferation of political parties in Nigeria. Particular attention was paid to the organizational structure of the party in relation to the dominance of the party