Balarabe Musa, National Chairman, Conference of Nigeria Political Parties (CNPP) has said that defection of politicians from one party to another undermined the political development of Nigeria.
While describing as “mindless” the manner in which politicians defect to other political parties, he said there was the need to check the trend for stability within the polity.
“The defection by members of political parties is mindless. This is because there is a lot of loose money in the country and anybody with sufficient money can go to any other party to achieve his ambition. The root of defection is money politics,” Musa said.
According to the CNPP chairman, another reason why politicians decamp is due to lack of internal democracy within political parties.
“This lack of internal democracy is what results to this threatening level of defection in the country,” he said.
Musa however said that defection on its own was not wrong as it was even democratic.
“Normally there is nothing wrong with defection, it is democratic, it is the utilisation of the constitutional provision for freedom of association and choice,” he said.
Musa said the phenomenon happened in all countries of the world adding that in advanced countries defection happened rarely and if it happened, there must be honourable reasons for it.