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Peoples Democratic Party (Nigeria)

Nigerian political party founded 1998

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 17, 2026
Entity authorityQ1551163 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is one of the two major contemporary political parties in Nigeria, along with its main rival, the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Its policies generally lie towards the center-right of the political spectrum. It won every presidential election between 1999 and 2011. Until the 2015 elections, it was the governing party in the Fourth Republic, although several elections during this period were disputed.

History

The PDP grew out of the anti-Sani Abacha military rule groups: G-18 led by Abubakar Rimi, and its successor, G-34, led by Alex Ekwueme. On 19 August 1998, since the beginning of the transition to civilian rule under Abdulsalami Abubakar, 25 political associations, including the All Nigerian Congress (ANC), Peoples Consultative Forum (PCF), Social Political Party (SPP), Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM), and Peoples National Forum (PNF), resolved to form a Peoples Democratic Party. The party was launched in Abuja on 31 August 1998. The founding chairman of the Steering Committee was Alex Ekwueme, and the Secretary was Jerry Gana.

In 1998, the PDP in its first presidential primary election held in Jos, Plateau State, North Central Nigeria nominated former military leader Olusegun Obasanjo who had just been released from detention as political prisoner as the presidential candidate in the elections of February 1999, with Atiku Abubakar (Governor-Elect of Adamawa State and a former leading member of the Social Democratic Party) as his running mate. They won the presidential election and were inaugurated on 29 May 1999.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Peoples Democratic Party (Nigeria)” is nigerian political party founded 1998. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Peoples, Democratic and Party, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1999, 2011, 2015, 1998—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1998-01-01. For this dossier, Peoples, Democratic and Party is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “nigerian political party founded 1998” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1551163. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1999, 2011, 2015 and 1998.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
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  • Search vocabulary
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Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Peoples Democratic Party (Nigeria)”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Peoples Democratic Party (Nigeria) primary sources, Peoples Democratic Party (Nigeria) archive and Peoples research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Peoples Democratic Party (Nigeria)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.