Does the imposition of a Candidate at Party Primaries Increase the Probability of Winning an Election?

This paper argues that candidate nomination at party primaries has been characterized by obvious infractions of the constitutional and institutional provisions that regulate internal party democracy. Two dominant perspectives explain this form of fractured internal party democracy. On the one hand, there is the privatized party structure, where candidate nomination is guided by a mixture of personal or factional interests, while on the other hand, candidate nomination is considered an appendage of elected executive authorities, defined as "leader". Party caucuses and "leaders" most often exercise power at their own discretion and are unencumbered by rules, usually subverting party rules through personal directives. The imposition of candidates does not only weaken the legal legitimacy of candidates but also makes the use of violence as the prevailing alternative for elections. We relied on general elections of 2015 and 2019 as well as three-party structures to provide evidence on candidate imposition and monopoly of violence in Nigeria. Data were obtained from secondary sources such as; party manifestoes, constitutions, electoral acts and court decisions on elections. Simple descriptive statistics were used to analyze quantitative data, while logical conclusion was used for the non-numerical data. Based on the analysis, it was concluded that the imposition of candidates at primary elections is sustained through electoral violence.