Tinubu: 2027 Year Of Contest Or Coronation? -By Simon Imobo-Tswam

Politics is not a precision science like Mathematics or Physics, so its outcomes don’t easily lend themselves to accurate predictions.

It is in this context that the title of this media intervention (Tinubu: 2027 Year of Contest or Coronation?) is a question rather than a prediction or a decoration.

There is an emerging consensus in the country that, in spite of everything, the President’s second-term hopes are realisable. In fact, the more enthusiastic of his supporters insist that 2027 will be Tinubu’s Year of Coronation and Consolidation.

As a student of Nigerian politics, researching into the currents, mechanics, dynamics and psychology of power and power-players, I find myself in total agreement. The overwhelming evidence doesn’t support contrary thinking.

On May 29, 2023 when Tinubu took the presidential oath, the PDP had in its kitty 11 governorships; and the APC, 23. However,
as at today, the tally of governors and their political parties stands thus: APC, 31 states; PDP, Nigeria’s erstwhile ruling party, two states: Bauchi and Oyo. That’s 33.

The remaining three states are shared by the three outliers ie Accord (1); APGA (1) and Labour Party (1). The inscrutable thing is that even these opposition-governors identify with the Tinubu presidency and its constitutional extension.

And there are speculations that the PDP may soon have only one governor i.e. Gov. Seyi Makinde of Oyo as Gov. Bala Mohammed of Bauchi state is rumoured to be on the verge of joining the APC too. (His defection will be an earthquake of sorts as he is the Chairman of the PDP Governors’ Forum)!

Nature, we say, abhors vacuums, and, accordingly, PDP’s consecutive losses have been APC’s gains. APC now has 31 governorships, and counting. Let that sink, especially knowing the impact of performing incumbents on electoral outcomes.

Similarly, at the inauguration of this 10th National Assembly on June 13, 2023, the APC held 59 Senate seats and 178 seats in the House of Representatives, while the one-governor parties managed the rest.

Today, the ruling party shows an unprecedented dominance of the National Assembly, with its commanding control of no fewer than 80 senators and 241 members of the Lower Chamber! No ruling party in Nigeria’s history has achieved this feat; and we can go back as far as 1957 when Nigeria’s first (and only) Prime Minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, formed the first all-Nigeria Government!

Fears of Nigeria becoming a one-party state continue to be expressed here and there by opposition-politicians and their media amplifiers. The fears may be genuine, given the parlous, even pathetic, state of opposition-parties – it’s either they are either factionalised, fractured, fractious or rudderless.

However, criminalising the freedom of choice as being exercised by the hordes of defectors, and charging the APC or President Tinubu with forcing a one-party agenda on the country derives majorly from
political malice and overflowing mischief.

Sometimes, the charge is that the presidency is coercing opposition-governors to dump their parties! When proving that becomes rocket-science, you hear something as asinine as the government offering PDP governors N200bn to defect!

And, while the rabble might be persuaded to uncritically agree with these charges of one-party agenda, perceptive analysts are seeing through their well-orchestrated falsehood, and are identifying the authors for who they truly are i.e. rabble-rousers and fear-mongers smartly clothing their looming defeats in the garbs of bombastic sophistry.

Let’s keep our eyes on the reality on the ground and we go on. Constitutionally, the APC is on safe ground. Section 15 (1) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) stresses the imperatives of
national unity and national integration across our diverse landscape.

Furthermore, Section 222(a) specifically mandates political parties to maintain a national presence, including offices in at least two-thirds of the 36 states, besides Abuja.

No one or group can, in fairness, charge the APC with running a sub-national government or a sectionally structured party leadership, with limited geographical presence. So, on both counts, the APC has satisfied the critical requirements of Sections 15 and 22. (To parody a saying in the Tiv country, “APC hii or ga”)!

But that’s not all. Section 225(1) of the Constitution compels parties to reflect federal character (inclusiveness) in their operations.
On this score too, the increasingly indomitable APC has shown compliance.

With an unprecedented control of 31 Government Houses as well as a wholesale takeover of the National Assembly, the APC looks almost invincible and its presumed presidential candidate, Tinubu, unbeatable.

There are poorly thought-out arguments that seek to belittle this dominance. One is that President Goodluck Jonathan had nearly 30 governors, but still lost his re-election bid in 2015.
Fact: Jonathan had a fractious party with divided loyalties and a spiralling centre.

Plus, his grip on the National Assembly (NASS) was, at best, tenuous. This was despite his accession to power through NASS’ auspicious Doctrine of Necessity.

And from another quarter, comes the argument that in 1999, PDP had no single governor or NASS member, but it went on to clear the 1999 general elections.
Fact: True, PDP had no seats anywhere then, but then, there was no ruling party controlling 31 state governors, and with an intimidating NASS dominance!

Additionally, the opposition-parties are in disarray, with the more ambitious ones even being without National EXCOs! PDP, the party that ended military rule in Nigeria, once the largest party in Africa, has moved from: The Spectacular to the Spectator and has now become the Spectacle! It’s, indeed, a classic case of “How are the mighty fallen!”

The African Democratic Congress (ADC) came huffing and puffing, but has suddenly lost steam and become enervated. Even its National Chairman, Chief David Mark, known for always making his deft political marks, has found himself being strongly marked by challenging political arithmetic and enigmatic Tinubu phenomenon.

It all looks like after all the boasts and the tough talks, the next election might end up as Nigeria’s most over-rated presidential contest; and 2027, itself, being Tinubu’s Year of Two Cs: Coronation and Consolidation.

The other day, someone even added a Third C i.e. Convocation. Upon enquiry, I was educated thus: “As Nigeria’s first Politician-President, and as Nigeria’s King-Maker who has become the King, Tinubu deserves induction into the Hall of Fame as a Chartered Politician.”

And yet, there is no swashbuckling walk from the Asiwaju of Practical Politics; no grandiloquent speeches about his ambidexterity and no presidential swagger, suggesting his political invincibility.

The President is exerting himself as if he is an out-of-power, opposition-politician. As far back as December last year, he inaugurated a committee of political henchmen to coordinate the activities of Renewed Hope Initiative (RHI) in the six geo-political zones. Even before the whistle has been blown, the man has gone to work!

Top on the list was former Delta State Governor and presidential running- mate on the Opposition-platform, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa. He emerges as the South-South Coordinator of the RHI. It’s a choice that’s deep. His is a choice that speaks about the power of conviction, one flowing from a Damascene experience.

Other zonal coordinators are: Messrs Isah Yuguda (North-East), Aminu Bello Masari (North-West), Sen. Anyim Pius Anyim (South-East) Oladipupo Oyinbande (South-West), and Tanko Al-Makura (North-Central). The first three names all have PDP bloodlines.

And only recently, the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, revealed how the party is working on a strategy to secure scores of millions of votes for the President, Come 2027, with over 10 million votes being targeted from just the South-West Geo-political Zone.

Someone else might have been moved to give flesh to the words of one-time Presidential Adviser, Chief Kingley Ozumba Mbadiwe of blessed memory who said: “When the come comes to become the coke, the happen will happen.” But that’s not this President. Although he is basking in popular adulation and riding the waves of mass acclamation, he has no contempt for the Opposition or a patronising indifference towards the people. He prefers to walk the high-road of executive humility and exemplify the democratic ideal. In other words, political opponents are not necessarily political enemies and to him, “My people” is not a mere political slogan, but a verbal handshake.

It’s in this context that the President recently and quietly hosted leaders of some political parties at the Presidential Villa in Abuja in a spirit of dialogue and camaradrie.

Still, something else stands this president out – his disposition to the media. A one-time US President, Thomas Jefferson, is reported to have said: “If I had to choose between government without newspapers, and newspapers without government, I wouldn’t hesitate to choose the latter.”

There have been Nigerian presidents who clearly think otherwise. They have despised Nigerian journalists and shown them open contempt via public ridicule, if not worse.

But that’s not Tinubu’s style. For him, journalists are not social pests, but partners in the agenda of development. For someone who owned a media empire before becoming President, anything less would excite national curiosity.

During his Interfaith Ramadan Interface with Nigerian journalists at the Presidential Villa, the President confessed:
“There’s no morning that I ever leave my house without going through the newspapers. It’s an addiction. I read all of you.”

This is another commendable way of saying: “I receive daily security reports from my advisers, but I also get my daily reports from the people directly.” That’s Tinubu for you.

As the APC readies itself for its national convention, with the methodical Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda
in superintendence, the hope is that the ruling will renew and reposition itself as the party-in-power so that it can continue to be a veritable partner to the Government-in-power.

That way, the marriage of Programmes and Policies will continue to be seamless, with concomitant dividends for the people.

Imobo-Tswam, erstwhile Special Adviser to two PDP National Chairmen, writes from Abuja. He can be reached at: simonpita2008@gmail.com