…Duke backs consensus candidate
…G100 seeks enforceable four-year pact for opposition alliance
Opposition leaders have begun closing ranks ahead of the 2027 elections, vowing to replicate the political realignment that produced the historic defeat of President Goodluck Jonathan in 2015.
The development followed a summit of opposition political stakeholders in Abuja on Monday, where leaders stressed the need for unity and a strong coalition to challenge President Bola Tinubu and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2027.
In 2015, opposition parties united under the APC and rallied behind Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), ending Jonathan’s re-election bid and producing Nigeria’s first defeat of a sitting president at the polls.
The opposition is now seeking to recreate that political momentum in 2027.
Donald Duke, presidential candidate of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), has pledged to support whoever emerges as the consensus presidential candidate from the opposition coalition talks ahead of the 2027 general elections.
Duke said his commitment to opposition unity would remain intact regardless of the outcome of negotiations among the parties.
“We will support any political party that emerges in 2027. Whatever decision is arrived at today, I will not walk away but will strive all along because that’s what the people want to see,” Duke said.
The summit, convened by the G100 in collaboration with the Minority Caucus of the House of Representatives, brought together leaders and presidential candidates from six opposition parties — the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Allied Peoples Movement (APM), Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), PRP and SDP.
The meeting came as opposition parties intensify efforts to overcome the fragmentation that weakened their challenge to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 2023 presidential election.
Fredrick Agbedi, Minority Leader of the House of Representatives, also urged opposition parties to bury their individual ambitions, unite behind a common platform and replicate the political strategy that enabled the All Progressives Congress (APC) to defeat the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2015.
He said the House Minority Caucus partnered with the G100 to consolidate the opposition and end what he described as the fragmentation threatening their electoral prospects.
“On behalf of the Minority Caucus of the House of Representatives, we decided that we partner with the G100 to see how the opposition parties can come together, streamline our ambitions, and ensure that we take this government out,” Agbedi said.
“If we are united, what the APC did in 2015, we can repeat it, we can do it. Some will say it’s late, but we feel it’s better late than never,” he added.
In his remarks, Salihu Mohammed Lukman, G100 convener and former Director-General of the Progressives Governors’ Forum (PGF), proposed a government of national competence anchored on competence, integrity, national inclusion and fair representation, with a disciplined four-year National Reset Programme backed by an enforceable Transition Charter.
He warned that previous opposition agreements failed because promises were not enforceable. “This gathering does not need more sincerity. Nigerian politics has never suffered from a shortage of sincere promises,” he said.
Lukman insisted that any agreement “must be written, it must be witnessed, and it must have consequences.” He cited the 2015 opposition victory as evidence that unity could work, contrasting it with 2023, when opposition candidates collectively secured more votes than the eventual winner but remained divided.
The framework proposes a central leadership committee, publicity and communication committee and legal committee, alongside five working groups on democratic renewal, the transition charter, national reforms, opposition unity and a common presidential candidate.
Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, National Chairman of the PRP, however, declared that opposition parties will unite and fight to unseat President Tinubu in the 2027 election.
“We are not here because we are too weak. We are here because we believe the fight to get this government out of powe is absolutely imperative. In 2027, we will together remove this government and put the Nigerian nation on a different trajectory,” he said.
