PRESIDENCY 2027: If not Tinubu who else? By Dele Sobowale,
“You can’t beat something with nothing” – American baseball team coach after his team lost 17 games in a row.
Since governance has been suspended for active politicking in Nigeria until May 2027, we might as well stop deceiving ourselves and squarely face the issue of selection of our President from 2027 to 2031.
In that connection, it is only sensible to assume that President Tinubu will re-contest – irrespective of what Nigerians think of his performance. No elected official – President, Governor, Local Government Chairman, etc – has ever declared himself a failure.
On the contrary, they frequently assess their performance as excellent or the best in history.
Because few people can resist the call to “come and eat”, appointed officials, party members and a legion of media sycophants are ever ready to swear on their mother’s graves that giant strides are being made. “The arch-flatterer, with whom all the petty flatterers have intelligence, is the man himself” – Francis Bacon, 1561-1626.
The Buhari government offers a good example of what happens when a man is in power and he falls into the grip of flatterers. Who can ever forget that Vice President Professor Osinbajo (SAN), Special Advisers Garba Shehu, Pastor Femi Adesina and Laolu Akande were among the people gleefully announcing to Nigerians and the world that Buhari had lifted 10 million Nigerians out of poverty – without providing proof? They were prepared to engage anyone who disagreed with the fallacy. Buhari actually believed them and even presented that fraudulent trophy as one of his achievements.
Today, nobody in Buhari’s government will raise his/her voice whenever he is accused of deepening poverty or nurturing murderous herdsmen during his eight years in office.
Have they individually or collectively lost their voices? No.
Their plates have been removed and given to new people.
The incentive to lie with a straight face for Buhari has been removed.
Some are even plotting to be invited to the Tinubu Table – in order to resume the old game of deceit for personal gain.
THE SEASON OF MEDIA MERCENARIES AND AGIPS
“Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous; and if one holds his state based on these arms, he will stand neither firm nor safe” – Niccolo Machiavelli, 1469-1527
Military and political mercenaries have existed from the first wars waged by human beings.
Soldiers of fortune who believe in nothing but are willing to lend their prowess to any side in a military or political contest – if the price is right.
In Nigerian politics, we call them AGIP – Any Government In Power.
Some of those who campaigned for Jonathan, as if their lives depended on it, and were well-remunerated, are now promoting Tinubu who shoved GEJ off the presidential office – just as eagerly.
I switch to another channel each time some of them appear on any TV channel I am watching.
Dogs eating their own vomit are less despicable – as far as I am concerned.
Still Nigerian politicians obviously cannot do without them.
Columnists and other public opinion influencers who bashed Jonathan and declared him “clueless”; derided his wife as poorly educated quickly discovered statesmanship and great performance by the man once invited to “come and eat” with lucrative appointments.
Like dancers at a party, when the music changes, they changed their dance steps. Money certainly makes everything legitimate.
AGIPs are again on the prowl during this election season.
IT IS NOT TOO EARLY TO DECLARE FOR THE PRESIDENCY
“Procrastination is the grave in which opportunity is buried” – Brewer Stock.
We are less than two years away from the next general elections.
To the best of my knowledge, only unforeseen circumstances can prevent President Tinubu from emerging once again as the flag-bearer for the All Progressives Congress, APC.
That settled; every voter in Nigeria is faced with one important question: If not Tinubu, who else?
And, the who else had better showed up very quickly because there are 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, 774 Local Governments and about 6,023 wards to cover and canvass for votes.
That is a daunting undertaking for even the already known candidate; it might become a mission impossible – if left much longer.
“Alliances are held together by fear; not by love” – Harold Macmillan, the late British Prime Minister/Publisher, 1894-1986.
It was because the leaders of the Action Congress, Congress for Progressive Change, as well as others, realised that none of them could alone defeat the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and Jonathan that a new party was cobbled together – with assistance from renegade members of the PDP.
Complacency and political miscalculation induced Jonathan to underestimate the danger – until it was too late.
That is a mistake the APC and Tinubu are unlikely to make; except for one thing — complacency.
Right now, with the PDP almost dead and buried (a victim of its own hubris), APC is the only game in town.
Until a new political party emerges, the spectre of a one-party nation hangs over us.
While this would temporarily benefit the APC and its leaders, it will portend the beginning of the end of democracy in Nigeria.
Indeed, we might inadvertently be destroying democracy at the same time as we are now celebrating the triumph of June 12, 1993.
Soldiers for democracy run the risk of trampling it underfoot by creating a political monster which will eventually uproot it. Tyranny might not be premeditated, but, a one-party state will return the nation to re-starting the struggle for freedom.
That is precisely why the prospective leaders of the opposition, the presidential candidates, must step forward now before it is too late.
FIRST TWO APC CASUALTIES EMERGE IN THE RACE FOR 2027
“Ganduje resigns as National Chairman of APC” – News Report, Friday, June 27, 2025.
Nobody falls from an aircraft flying at 30,000 feet above sea level, without a parachute – unless he contemplates suicide or was pushed by those bent on homicide. The Chairman of the ruling party in Nigeria has so much going for him suicide must be the last thing on his mind.
Among other perquisites of that office, he has unlimited access to Aso Rock – including the free food available 24/7. Added to that he is allowed use of aircraft from the Presidential Fleet or use of private jet when the need arises.
No delayed or cancelled flights affect him. Visit to any state, governed by the APC, must end with “something for petrol” – for somebody who no longer queues at the filling station.
Thousands of appointment and mandate seekers would spend an arm and a leg to see him.
Nothing goes for nothing.
So, why should anybody in his right mind resign from such a sinecure job?
Most Nigerians would not.
That was why the minute I read the story, it was clear that the poor man was pushed. Another story revealed that he was told to resign on Monday, June 30, 2025 to pave way for the reception of Kwankanso, who is regarded as a bigger political asset, into the APC.
Because, the two are now sworn enemies, somebody has to go.
Ganduje was going to be pushed out of the aircraft literally.
Given an offer he could not refuse, he opted to jump out on his own.
A cruel political fate awaits him.
With the canopy of federal might removed, Ganduje has now been thrown to his enemies in Kano to deal with.
However, he was not even the first casualty of real-politics of 2027.
The first real casualty of the political re-alignment going on was Kashim Shettima.
I know very little about the working relationship between the President and Vice President; or for that matter, if the VP has in any way proved disloyal. Furthermore, I have never met Shettima. But, there is something inhumane about the way his replacement on the ticket is being discussed by party members.
Only in politics would such callousness be regarded as business as usual – a man being cut to ribbons right on his seat.
Of the two, Shettima has my sympathies. Where does he go from here?
If he was nursing the ambition of succeeding Tinubu when he accepted to be his running mate, he can now see clearly that the road has been closed.
In fact, the only time a Vice President succeeded a President in Nigeria was when Yar’Adua died suddenly – presenting the country with no other choice but Jonathan. Otherwise, Dr Alex Ekwueme, Atiku Abubakar and Osinbajo had failed to succeed their principals.
History might be about to repeat itself in Nigeria.
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“You can’t beat something with nothing” – American baseball team coach after his team lost 17 games in a row. Since governance has been suspended for active politicking in Nigeria until May 2027, we might as well stop deceiving ourselves and squarely face the issue of selection of our President from 2027 to 2031. In […]
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, , Emmanuel Okogba, {authorlink},, , Vanguard News, July 6, 2025, 2:57 am
