The African Democratic Congress 2023 presidential candidate, Dumebi Kachikwu, said the faction of the party led by former Senate President David Mark was deliberately structured to produce former Vice President Atiku Abubakar as the 2027 presidential flag bearer.
Speaking to journalists in Abuja on Thursday, Kachikwu said the group told him during their meeting that their main interest was reclaiming power.
He dared the coalition leaders to prove him wrong by publicly declaring that the 2027 presidential ticket would be zoned to the South.
Dumebi stated, “it’s a coalition that has been designed and engineered to produce Atiku Abubakar as its flag bearer, and that is an absolute truth.”
President Tinubu’s government has posted a blend of successes and setbacks across different sectors, yet opposition politicians from multiple parties still dismiss the All ProgressivesCongress-led administration as a failure.
To forge a stronger front for the 2027 elections, prominent opposition figures announced a fresh political coalition in Abuja on 20 March, a move that triggered national debate over the prospects of a united opposition.
Following prolonged negotiations, Labour Party flag-bearer Peter Obi, former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, ex-Kaduna governor Nasir El-Rufai, former Rivers governor Rotimi Amaechi and others converged in Abuja on Wednesday to present the ADC as the coalition’s platform.
Although most of these political heavyweights have yet to take up formal ADC membership, they publicly pledged loyalty to the party, which is now under interim leadership—David Mark as national chairman and Rauf Aregbesola as national secretary—after Ralph Nwosu and others stepped down.
In a swift reaction, the party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Dumebi Kachikwu, issued a statement on Wednesday accusing Atiku, Obi and their allies of hijacking the party and lacking the capacity to lead it.
Narrating his encounter with the coalition leaders, he stated, “Late last year they approached me concerning this coalition. Eventually, early this year, I agreed to have a meeting with them; a close friend of mine persuaded me to go for a meeting and hear these people out.
“I went for this meeting that had former ministers, former highly placed person in the last the last government, and they presented their case to me: the need for a coalition. Everything they said was about Bola Ahmed Tinubu and how his government has destroyed Nigeria.
“But I had only one question, because in opposition, you have only one ambition: for you to be the ruling party. So, for us as a party, our plan is how, in the next election, we can win the elections, or we can ensure that we have more people from the party emerge in various offices across the country.
“So, if somebody wants to speak about coalition and how to achieve this, we are willing to listen.”
Dumebi urged the Mark-led ADC to promptly clarify the party’s stance on the power rotation between the South and the North.
The ADC 2023 candidate continued, “But I had one question, and my question was this: seeing that we just finished eight years of President Buhari and that President Tinubu is in his first term, and that you people here, you old politicians that practice a politics of north and south, of regions, do you agree and accept that, if there is a coalition, the south is in its first term and that the south will produce the flag bearer of this coalition? And the response—not considered, immediate response—was, We are taking our power back.
“Now imagine my situation as someone who was the presidential flag bearer of a party that came fifth in the last elections. You are saying to me that I cannot aspire to office, that I should foreclose my ambition, that because I happen to be from the south of Nigeria and that there is a presumed majority from the north of Nigeria, that you will take your power back.
“So that’s a question for me, and that was an absolute no-no for me, and that ended every talk about coalition, because it was very clear that the coalition was engineered to produce Atiku Abubakar as its flag bearer.
“Now, I still say this today: I’m throwing this challenge to this coalition today, to make a pronouncement today that the flag bearer of this coalition will be someone from the southern part of Nigeria so that the second term of the southerners will be finished. Make that statement a categorical statement and we’ll admit you through the front door and say that there is a conversation to be had.”
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