The camp of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has cautioned opposition parties against restricting the 2027 presidential ticket to the South, warning that such a move could hand President Bola Tinubu an easy path to re-election.
In a statement released on Monday in Abuja, Atiku’s media aide, Olusola Sanni, argued that although the ruling All Progressives Congress may continue with its southern presidential arrangement around Tinubu, it would be politically risky for opposition parties to adopt the same strategy without considering electoral realities.
Sanni stated that politics should be driven by strategy, coalition-building, and practical electoral calculations rather than emotions or selective moral arguments.
“The first and most obvious question is this: how does a Southern opposition candidate realistically unseat a sitting Southern president? Nigerian political history offers no precedent for such an outcome. No incumbent president has ever been defeated by an opposition challenger from the same geopolitical bloc. To insist otherwise is to enter the contest already defeated,” he said.
The statement also questioned the fairness argument being used to support southern zoning, noting that by 2027, the South would have spent more years in power than the North since the beginning of the Fourth Republic.
“By 2027, the South would have held presidential power for approximately 18 years in the Fourth Republic, compared to about 10 years for the North. If the South retains power for another four years, that disparity widens even further. It therefore becomes difficult to understand the justice in an argument that seeks to deepen an already existing imbalance under the guise of equity,” Sanni added.
The Atiku camp further accused some political actors of hypocrisy in the zoning debate, especially individuals who supported the emergence of former President Goodluck Jonathan in 2011 following the death of late President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua.
“It is intellectually dishonest for those who enthusiastically supported a Southern presidency under Goodluck Jonathan in 2011, despite the North’s legitimate expectation under the informal zoning arrangement, to now suddenly posture as custodians of rotational justice.
“Principles do not become sacred only when they align with personal ambition,” the statement read.
While acknowledging the South-East’s desire to produce a president, the statement warned against turning the aspiration into political tokenism.
“The South-East deserves a sustainable and credible pathway to national leadership, not symbolic tokenism or bespoke arrangements tailored to satisfy one individual’s ambition,” it stated.
The former Vice President’s camp urged opposition parties to focus on building a strong national coalition capable of defeating the current administration instead of relying on what it described as emotional narratives.
“Defeating an incumbent president requires realism, not romanticism; strategy, not sentiment; honesty, not selective memory. The opposition must decide whether its goal is to make an emotional statement or to actually win power,” the statement concluded.
Elijah Adeyemi
No comments:
Post a Comment