2027: Coalition syndicate grasping at straws to advance their mess

By Ogundele Aderemi

“A house whose building blocks are plastered with saliva will in no time be brought down by dewdrops”, so says a popular adage. “Ile ti a fi ito mo, iri ni yio wo”. This proverb summarizes the nature of the most talk about coalition stuff being masterminded by Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.

Emerging facts are now unfolding the identity of the coalition hatchet man in each of the six geo-political zones. In the South West is Rauf Aregbesola, the former governor of Osun State. In the South East is Mr Peter Obi, the former Presidential Candidate of the Labor Party in the 2023 general elections. In the South South is Rotimi Amaechi, the former Minister of Transport under President Muhammadu Buhari.

In the North Central is Senator David Mark, a former two-term Senate President. In the North West is Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, the immediate past governor of Kaduna State and finally is Alhaji Atiku Abubakar the former Vice President under OBJ for the North East. These are the supermen saddled with the responsibilities of ensuring that the coalition works the magic of sending President Bola Ahmed Tinubu out of power in 2027.

If we may cast our minds back to the time of the first ever political tsunami, when a formidable and successful coalition was formed in Nigeria, it would give us an insight into the fact that Atiku Abubakar and his co-travellers are only wasting time by chasing shadows. What they are doing is simply a mimic or a caricature of what it takes to form a serious coalition.

The All Progressives Congress (APC) was formed in February 2013 through a merger of several opposition parties. It is not a party considered to have been formed by a single founder. Rather, it resulted from amalgamation of existing political parties. They were determined to break the jinx of the invincibility of the incumbent president, and they actually got it right.

Specifically, it was formed by the merger of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), and a faction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). It was also joined by the N-PDP which was congregated by a good chunk of the then serving National Assembly Members led by Senator Bukola Saraki and a couple of serving governors led by Rotimi Amaechi.

It was an alliance of people of like minds which graduated into a coalition and ended up in a merger. One distinctive feature of the coalition then was that none of the major players put his presidential ambition ahead of the success of the project. Unlike what is happening now where Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi and Rotimi Amaechi are seriously jostling for the presidential ticket even before taking the first step.

Another noticeable contrast is that while the aforementioned nomadic politicians are still shopping for a platform to hire for their ambition, by this time of 2013, a brand new party was already registered named the APC. The need to carve a fresh identity for the platform to accommodate the interest of the legacy parties was never a subject of debate or controversy. The founders knew it was the right thing to do and the decision to have it done was taken at the nick of time.
Next is the nature of inter-party migration that occurred before, during and after the formation of the APC. The APC harvested virtually all the defectors to its fold then.

The mode of defection of high profile politicians hitting the opposition parties these days is unidirectional and massive. The major opposition parties such as the PDP and the Labor Party are losing their illustrious members to the ruling party. This is contrary to the usual expectations that a coalition of such political figures would enjoy some level of attraction just as the APC did in 2013. This is not the case as we speak. It is still the APC enjoying the big boost and remarkable consolidation of its strength.

Only God knows what miracle the likes of Atiku, Obi and El-Rufai who I do refer to as nomadic politicians will perform to turn the tide against the ruling party in the future elections. The inclusion of Rotimi Amaechi in the pack is nothing to be panicked about. He was unceremoniously pushed out of the PDP by Nyesom Wike in 2013. Since then, his political influence in the Rivers politics has been dwindling. Therefore , it is not wrong to describe him as an inconsequential and political strawman of Rivers State. This is the man to deliver the South South to Atiku’s coalition. Quite laughable!
Slated to do a similar job in the South West is Rauf Aregbesola who in the eyes of the people is a dissident and a betrayal of the highest order. It is not an exaggeration that in the South West, Aregbesola has a very low voice that can hardly influence any tangible support for the coalition syndicate. In Osun State where he served as the governor for eight years, he can only command a squad of foot soldiers, and not an army of supporters. He is obviously limited in capacity to determine or influence the political direction of the South West

In the case of Senator David Mark, he is a politician that has been on holiday for quite a while. I cannot recollect when last he made news on any political activities. It is like the man is quietly enjoying his retirement having served the military, quitted and came back to make some remarkable appearance in the political space. For the coalition syndicate to drag him back to coordinate their ill-fated political agenda will amount to calling on Emmanuel Okala to come and man the goal post for the Super Eagles in the next World Cup Tournament.

The only possible saving grace for Atiku Abubakar and Nasir El-Rufai to make an impact in the North East and North West respectively is only if either of them is on the ballot as the presidential candidate of their party. And this can only be achieved to an extent based on tribal and religious sentiments. Neither of them has natural appeal nor antecedents to deliver on such mandate on a good day. Neither of them has political disciples from their home state walking along with them in that journey. They are relatively lonely. The only thing they have is the inordinate ambition that is not backed by the conscious attention and support of the people.

While the APC entered the 2015 contest with political juggernauts across the country, massive support of the downtrodden, a handful of governors, a reasonable number of lawmakers at both the state and the national assemblies, this Atiku’s coalition is as weak as a straw both in composition, mobilization and structure.
The facts speak for itself!

B. Aderemi Ogundele
(JagunmoluBAO)
June 9, 2025.