The initial momentum that came with the announcement of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, as the platform for the opposition coalition, appears to be on the decline.
DAILY POST reports that this has been attributed to the reluctance of some presidential candidates, Peter Obi and Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, to officially join the party.
Former Governor of Anambra State and 2023 presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, former vice president and two-time presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Atiku Abubakar and former Governor of Rivers State and 2023 presidential aspirant, Chibuike Amaechi are some of the bigwigs in the coalition of political leaders.
DAILY POST reported that Abubakar, Obi, former Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, former Senate President, David Mark, former Governor of Osun State, Rauf Aregbesola, among others came together and adopted the ADC, as the official platform of the opposition coalition.
The coalition also has the likes of prominent figures such as former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal and former Justice Minister Abubakar Malami, once pillars of the All Progressives Congress, APC.
Together, these men were said to have found a new political vehicle in the ADC which also controversially adopted David Mark as interim national chairman and Aregbesola as national secretary.
Several credible sources within the coalition have now disclosed that the ADC is struggling to gain traction due to the refusal of Atiku, Obi, and other key political figures to officially join its ranks.
Members of the ADC National Working Committee, NWC, are reportedly worried that presidential hopefuls Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi are yet to formally register with the party.
Atiku has since left the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, but has remained partyless and is obviously reluctant to join the ADC.
Peter Obi, on the other hand, has not even left the Labour Party, LP, and in one of his interviews, maintained he would remain in the LP while following up on activities of the ADC.
However, some political analysts believe the former Anambra State governor might be shooting himself in the foot since such action could be counted as anti-party.
The body language of these politicians have remained unclear and very difficult to read as a lot of Nigerians are not even encouraged to also join the party.
DAILY POST reports that the Hon Nafiu Bala-led faction of the ADC has repeatedly pleaded with Abubakar, Obi, and Aregbesola and others to formally resign from previous parties and join the ADC.
ADC maintained that, according to its constitution, the new entrants must also register as members at ward levels in home states in line with the regulations of the Electoral Act 2022.
According to them, failure to comply with the rules, the politicians risk legal challenges that will undermine the coalition’s credibility.
While their next moves remain in the dark, there is the rumour that Obi could be returning to the PDP which gained traction after former Borno State Governor, Ali Modu Sheriff, claimed on Channels Television that Obi was considering rejoining the main opposition party ahead of the 2027 elections to contest its presidential ticket.
“Peter Obi wants to be President. Atiku has been Vice President, and for him, it’s President or nothing,” Sheriff stated, suggesting that both men were likely to clash over the ADC’s 2027 nomination if Obi joins the coalition party.
“Information available to me is that any moment from now, Obi would go back to the PDP and run as a presidential candidate under the PDP.
“So that leaves Vice President Atiku and (Rotimi) Amaechi. So tell me, which states do they control?” He queried.
Meanwhile, the ADC has since pushed against the idea of Obi defecting to the PDP, with its National Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi, on Arise TV, describing the such move as a risk which the former Anambra governor “cannot take.”
“Peter Obi knows better. It’s good to see that ADC’s involvement is forcing the PDP to make moves, but he is with us,” Abdullahi maintained.
Some political observers say Obi and Atiku’s action or inaction could fracture the unity of the coalition and derail efforts to mount a strong challenge in 2027.
The Acting National Chairman of a faction within the ADC, Bala, told DAILY POST he had expected the political leaders to officially join the party in their wards after it was adopted by the coalition political party.
“My expectation was that the next day after their declaration that they are interested to join us, I expected every one of them to go to their respective ward levels and register as a party member.
“But surprisingly, they did not. But they’re instead going about calling themselves coalition party members. Even David Mark who is posing to be the national chairman is not even a card-carrying member of the party.
“Those people parading themselves as ADC members are not registered. They’re not yet members of our party and the reason is I don’t know,” he said.
A chieftain of the APC and former National Publicity Secretary of the defunct New Peoples Democratic Party, nPDP, Chief Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, told DAILY POST that the delay in joining the ADC by Atiku and Obi is a strategic move by the opposition politicians.
“The two leaders’ reluctance or rather delay in joining ADC formally is both strategic and innovative,” Eze said in line with what a source in the camp of one of the leaders told our correspondent earlier.
“Their move is to checkmate the plot of Tinubu and his APC hatchets to destabilize ADC before its take off.
“At the moment, the two leaders are working behind the scene to ensure that the ADC structure is properly set up and her vision and ideology tallies with their own vision in reshaping and repositioning the country into a proper democratic State unlike what Tinubu has turned her into at the moment.
“The care and interest of every Nigerian, including both Atiku and Obi is how to remove Tinubu and his vision-less administration from office
“At the moment both Amaechi, Senator David Mark, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola and others are already formally registered with the party and are working assiduously in recruiting Nigerians into the party so there is no fear or need for any panicking on the party’s mission and drive for a better Nigeria.
“I am convinced that within the end of September both two leaders will formally join ADC knowing very well that ADC is the only path road and key in rescuing Nigeria from her present messy situation under Tinubu,” Eze said.
Also speaking with DAILY POST on the subject matter, Chief Peter Ameh, a former presidential aspirant and National Secretary of the Coalition of United Political Parties, CUPP, told DAILY POST that Obi is the strongest force within the members of the coalition.
Whichever way, Ameh said that what is of utmost importance at this point is to save the country which, according to him, is on the brink of collapse.
“Peter Obi is the biggest political commodity in the country today. He is the biggest politician on the front stage of our discussion today.
“There is not a day on national television, radio station, social media that he is not the subject of national discourse.
“There are so many political parties that are seeking to take Obi as their candidate and it is an added advantage to their political themes, public acceptance and public appeal and he brings the momentum of the support base across Nigeria.
“Obi has over 12 million votes, forget about what they tell you. The data is there. What INEC announced [is what is in the public]. The data that is hiding on the Irev that was also established by INEC.
“He won in Rivers State. He is the only politician to defeat Tinubu in Lagos. If you put his vote together in Lagos you know that his mandate was stolen.
“I believe with all my full chest that Obi is the only politician that will defeat Tinubu in 2027. I believe that with all my heart, with all the strategies that that man put in place in Lagos, no party in history since 1999 has been able to defeat Tinubu in Lagos.
“No party since 1999 with no senator, no House of Rep member, nothing, no political machinery behind him, but Obi defeated Tinubu in Lagos. Obi is the most viable option for the opposition to get back to the Presidency.”
Meanwhile Amaechi, one of the 2027 presidential aspirants who embraced the coalition, has taken the ADC to Rivers State and appears to be the only one whose intentions are clear and straightforward at this point.
2027: ADC momentum fades as top opposition leaders delay defection
