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—says coalition is
defective
By Senator Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau
Former Governor of Kano state, Senator Ibrahim Shekarau has sent a strong message to the former vice president Atiku Abubakar led coalition of politicians to go back to the drawing board as their strategy to unseat the All Progressive Congress (APC) government in 2027 is faulty.
Atiku, former governors of Rivers Rotimi Amaechi, Anambra’s Peter Obi and Kaduna’s Mallam Nasiru El- Rufai among others are in the forefront of the coalition.
Senator Shekarau in a statement went memory lane and told them in no unmistakable terms that the coalition is strategically defective.
Full text of the statement:
The coming together of some very senior members of some opposition parties is a very welcome development, as seen recently under what they call ‘coalition’ of opposition parties. But unfortunately, most people do not know that the claimed coalition move has nothing to do with the ‘major opposition parties’ – PDP and LP. It is so far a mere coalition of prospective Presidential/Vice Presidential aspirants. None of the principal actors is carrying the leadership of his party along. More so, the ‘gang-up’ of individuals, no matter their ‘big names’, can never be a ‘merger’, because, by law, only registered parties can formally and officially merge.
The first political merger in Nigeria was in 2013, when four registered parties, namely, ANPP, ACN, CPC and APGA melted together to form the APC. So, technically, APC is not a ‘new party’. It was an assortment of registered opposition political parties that were already fully on ground, with elected state governors, state and National Assembly members and local governments, as well as large grassroot followers. These were the factors that even attracted some of the then PDP Governors and legislators to also ran to join the APC. It is therefore wrong for anyone to assume that the 2013 merger that produced a strong opposition in APC is comparable to today’s ‘coalition’ of ‘aspirants’.
What happened at the National Assembly on March 20, 2025, in respect of the ‘State of Emergency’ in Rivers State, has exposed the characters in the ‘coalition’, that they had no control over the opposition parties in the National Assembly. For, if they did, the APC government could not have garnered the required number of votes to pass the law sent to the National Assembly by President Tinubu.
We also need to remember that in 2019 too, some senior members of the PDP mobilized a ‘coalition’ of about ten registered parties with the hope of defeating the APC, but it amounted to nothing because the then PDP elected leaders at all levels were not carried along. I remember the 2019 ‘coalition’ was formally launched almost a year to the 2019 elections at Yar’adua Center, and where none of the then elected PDP leaders was in attendance. Accordingly, no amount of noise making, or coming together, by individual characters (aspirants) in the name of opposition will make any impact at elections, until and unless the full structure of leadership at all levels of the opposition parties are carried along. For example, there is no way you will be talking of PDP going into coalition when none of its twelve elected governors and hundreds of its elected legislators across the country are not involved. The mistake some of the characters in the current ‘coalition’ move are making is that, they believe the 2023 votes are still there in their pockets, and need only to put them together and win the next election. This is the peak of naivety. Remember, in 2015, the PDP had more ‘big names’ plus sitting governments at Federal, state and local levels, yet it lost the election, because all the merging parties that produced the APC carried along all their entire structure at all levels into the ‘coalition’ (merger). Hence, defeating APC in 2027 is far beyond just the mere coming together of ‘big names’ (aspirants).
The over simplistic claim that it is the APC that is poaching and destabilizing the opposition parties is to me also being naive. Why are the ‘big names’ in the opposition parties unable to resist the poaching and join hands together in the parties to properly fund and build them up, and mobilize grassroot support. It is still not too late. I believe with the ‘correct’ vision, mission and focus, plus genuine sense of righteousness, the narrative in the opposition parties can be changed within this year, 2025 for success in the 2027 elections.
Wallahu a’alam.
Senator Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau,
Former Governor of Kano State
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