Opposition political parties are making moves to ally against the 2027 general elections. ONYEKACHI EZE examines the possibility of such an alliance dislodging the APC in the next presidential election
The recent statement from the National Consultative Front (NCFront) is heartwarming. The NCFront, an initiative of Prof. Pat Utomi, after its meeting in Abuja two weekends ago, said it is working for a possible alliance of opposition political parties in the country against the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2027. Utomi, a chieftain of the Labour Party (LP), was the 2011 presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC). NCFront acting spokesperson Mallam Hamisu San Turaki, said in the statement after the meeting, that opposition parties were “Holding consultations on how to streamline and strengthen their political forces to be able to rescue the country from the dangerous slide into misrule and anarchy foisted by the All Progressives Congress-led federal government.”
He added that “Unity of the opposition in Nigeria will, without stress, defeat and overthrow the present flip-flop governance and wrongheaded policies of the present Tinubu-led APC administration.” This is indeed true. The little over eight million votes scored by Bola Tinubu that made the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to declare him winner of the 2023 presidential election was less than half of the combined votes of the three opposition parties, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), the LP and the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), in the election. This is not the first time opposition political parties have tried to forge a common front against a ruling party. It has become a recurring decimal in every election cycle.
But only one of such attempts had been successful in the history of Nigeria’s multi-party democracy, and that was in 2015. Nigerians with a sense of history might remember the formation of the Progressive Parties Alliance (PPA) in the run-up to the 1983 general elections, by opposition political parties of the second republic. This alliance however failed to stop the ruling National Party of Nigeria (NPN) from winning a “landslide” in the election – The reason being the failure of the coalition parties to agree on a consensus presidential candidate for the election. The four parties in the alliance, the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), the Nigeria People’s Party (NPP), the Great Nigeria People’s Party (GNPP), and the People’s Redemption Party (PRP), not only filed individual candidate for the 1983 presidential election on their political platforms, but a new political party, the National Advanced Party (NAP), also contested the election, which further split opposition votes.
The height of the opposition parties’ alliance was the 2018 formation of the Coalition of the United Political Parties (CUPP) by 40 registered parties led by the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). The coalition parties later signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU), “to mobilise support for consensus candidates at the centre, states, and the legislative arm of government.” Although Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the PDP candidate was later adopted as a consensus candidate for the 2019 presidential election by some CUPP members, the coalition again failed because the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) was able to break its rank with mouth-watering promises to some coalition parties, the promises that were observed in the breach.
Muhammadu Buhari, the APC candidate was re-elected. Even before the 2013 merger that eventually led to the formation of the APC, attempts by the opposition parties to come together before the 2011 general elections against the then-ruling party, the PDP, failed. The merger talk which collapsed at the last minute was between the Congress for Progressives Change (CPC) and the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN). ACN National Chairman Chief Bisi Akande, told journalists that the party decided to call the merger off because the CPC was not demonstrating sufficient seriousness and political will to forge a workable alliance. Akande said: “In the overall interest of the parties involved, our democracy as well as our country, each of the parties should go into the presidential election on its platform.”
The merger talk broke down because the CPC presidential candidate Major- General Muhammadu Buhari, and his ACN counterpart Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, refused to step down for each other, and so Dr. Goodluck Jonathan of the PDP was returned as president in 2011. The parties were however much wiser in 2013 by agreeing to register a new political party entirely, and that was why the merged talk was successful. The alliance parties, the ACN, the CPC and the All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP), returned their certificates of registration to INEC to enable them to register a brand new political party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the 2015 general elections. That was how they were able to resolve the issue of conflict of interest and wrestle power from the PDP.
There was a rumour of a possible alliance by candidates of the PDP, LP and NNPP before last year’s presidential election. Atiku even so in an interview with the BBC Hausa. But he was rejected by both the LP and the NNPP. Akin Osuntokun, the Director General of Labour Party presidential campaign said the alliance could only be possible if Atiku was ready to “renounce his ticket and throw his considerable political weight behind us. No individual ambition should override the North/ South rotation convention…” And for Major Agbor, the National Publicity Secretary of the NNPP, Atiku was the one to step down for Kwankwaso, not the other way around.
“There are talks and there would be no talks in this direction except the former vice-president throwing his weight of support for Dr. Rabiu Kwankwaso,” he added. With the failure of the PDP and LP to upturn the election of President Bola Tinubu at the courts, opposition parties are once again forging an alliance against the 2027 general elections. The PDP candidate Alhaji Atiku Abubakar was the first to moot the idea when the leadership of the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) visited him. Atiku told his visitors “If we don’t come together to challenge what the ruling party is trying to create, our democracy will suffer for it, and the consequences of it will affect the generations yet unborn. The project of protecting democracy in our country is not about just one man.”
The immediate reaction from some opposition parties was dismissive. The Labour Party said it was reorganising after the 2023 general elections. But with the call by Utomi’s led NCFront, perhaps, the party may show interest. The three former presidential candidates, Atiku Abubakar of the PDP, Peter Obi of the LP and Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso of the NNPP, who are now leading opposition politics in the country, are not strangers to each other. Obi was Atiku’s running mate in the 2019 presidential election. There was also a move for him to pair with Kwankwaso in the 2023 presidential election.
Obi and Kwankwaso were in PDP until 2021/22 to contest on other party platforms. Therefore, allying may not be difficult if they are determined to work together. However, their ambition might work against the proposed alliance. Atiku has been trying to be Nigeria’s president since 1993. The last presidential election was his 6th. Although he will be 81 years old in 2027, the former vice president does not seem to be ready to quit politics. Many people expected him to announce his retirement from politics when he addressed PDP leaders after the Supreme Court rejected his appeal against Tinubu’s election, but he said he was not quitting politics now.
Obi, on the other hand, may not be likely to bury his presidential ambitions given his impressive performance in the last presidential election. The former Anambra State governor, against all odds, won in eleven states and Abjua, (the same number of states won by Tinubu and Atiku), to come third. He secured over six million votes. Obi is looking forward to giving the incumbent a strong fight in the next presidential election. Though Kwankwaso won only Kano State in the election, he still believes he has the chance to rule the country. A stronger opposition is good for the nation’s democracy, not only to win elections but to keep the ruling party on its toes.
This will bring about quality governance and accountability. Unfortunately, opposition in the third world especially in Africa is emasculated. We are already seeing a sign of it with the rate of movement to the ruling party within the last seven months. Opposition parties have the number to turn the tide against the ruling party if they agree to work together. Earlier in the day, however, a coalition of opposition platforms disclosed moves to birth what they call an ultra-political party ahead of the 2027 polls. This was disclosed by the National Consultative Front (NCFront) which also revealed that its inaugural meeting will be held this month.
Interestingly, the Labour Party and the PDP had at different times, last year, distanced themselves from talks of a merger following Atiku’s call for a united front among the opposition leaders. While the Labour Party presidential candidate in 2023, Peter Obi, recently declared that his party was ready to be Nigeria’s main opposition party this year, one of Atiku’s spokesmen, Daniel Bwala, stated that his boss will contest the 2027 election, warning that the opposition must unite behind him if they intend to unseat the APC. But in a dramatic twist, the Coalition for United Political Parties (CUPP) rejected Atiku as the rallying point of the opposition parties in Nigeria ahead of the 2027 general election.
Pundits and analysts had blamed divisions for the opposition’s defeat in the 2023 presidential election. Recall that major PDP figures had split from the party ahead of the 2023 polls. Obi had switched to the Labour Party; Dr Rabiu Musa Kwakwanso to the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), while the G-5 governors supported
