2027: Buhari’s loyalists move to stop Tinubu’s re-election bid

As Nigeria inches toward the 2027 general elections, President Bola Tinubu is facing growing resistance from within his own political family.

This is just as key allies of former President Muhammadu Buhari, once united under the All Progressives Congress, APC, banner, are now aligning with opposition forces to stop Tinubu’s second-term ambition, DAILY POST has observed.

What started as quiet disagreements among key figures in the APC has now grown into open resistance, driven by some of the most trusted allies of former President Muhammadu Buhari.

Prominent figures like ex-Kaduna governor, Nasir El-Rufai, former SGF, Babachir Lawal, as well as former ministers also in Buhari’s cabinet, Rotimi Amaechi, and Abubakar Malami, once pillars of the APC, are now rallying around a new opposition alliance, raising fresh questions about unity in the ruling party. A former National Chairman of the APC, John Odigie-Oyegun is also not left out.

This emerging coalition recently found a new political vehicle in the African Democratic Congress (ADC), which has controversially adopted former Senate President David Mark as interim national chairman and ex-Governor Rauf Aregbesola as secretary.

The cracks within the APC are not new. Tinubu, who played a pivotal role in Buhari’s ascension to the presidency in 2015, now finds himself increasingly isolated from those he once helped empower.

The APC was formed in 2013 as a coalition of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Buhari’s CPC, and the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP).

The union, though strategic, was always fragile. Buhari’s successful 2015 run, his fourth presidential attempt, was largely credited to Tinubu’s political machinery in the South-West and key alliances with northern heavyweights like El-Rufai and Amaechi in the South.

By 2023, however, the tide had turned. Tinubu, who described his presidential bid as a “lifelong ambition,” clinched the APC ticket against fierce opposition within the party.

He triumphed in a general election marred by currency redesign chaos, the controversial Muslim-Muslim ticket, and questions about his health and coherence on the campaign trail.

Significantly, he lost in all three ‘K states’: Kano, Kaduna, and Katsina, long considered strongholds of Buhari’s northern base, but still clinched the presidential seat.

The relationship between Tinubu and Nasir El-Rufai was always politically transactional