Former Director-General of the Progressives Governors Forum, Salihu Lukman, has warned supporters of former Labour Party presidential candidate Peter Obi and former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar against insisting on their preferred candidates ahead of the 2027 presidential election, saying such a position could strengthen President Bola Tinubu’s chances of re-election.
Lukman argued that opposition parties seeking to unseat the ruling All Progressives Congress must be prepared to rally behind a consensus candidate to prevent the division of votes among multiple presidential contenders.
He spoke on Saturday during an appearance on Channels Television’s Hard Copy, where he expressed confidence that opposition parties would eventually agree on a common candidate despite disagreements and mistrust among their leaders.
“Taking a hardline position, a rigid position, is almost like working for the APC and the Tinubu government at this point,” Lukman said.
He added that the country’s interest should take precedence over individual political ambitions, warning that opposition parties could struggle to defeat the ruling party if they entered the election with competing candidates.
“The country is superior to any individual,” he said.
Lukman, who convenes the political pressure group G-100, said negotiations for an opposition alliance had moved beyond the initial group, with political parties and their presidential candidates taking ownership of efforts to establish a common front.
He said the parties were working to build the trust required to reach an agreement, adding that the proposed consensus arrangement could be concluded weeks or even days before the January 16, 2027 presidential election.
“So it could be two months, some weeks to the election, or a few days to the election, they will come out and tell Nigerians this is the direction, and everybody will queue,” he said.
Trust Deficit Threatens Opposition Alliance
Lukman identified the lack of trust among opposition parties and their presidential candidates as the biggest obstacle to reaching an agreement.
He explained that a summit held on August 31 agreed to establish five working groups to advance the coalition process, including one responsible for selecting a consensus presidential candidate.
According to him, the proposed arrangement would ensure that decisions were made by representatives authorised by the parties and their respective candidates.
“The collegiate is basically about ensuring that both the parties and their candidates are the ones taking the decisions, and at the same time the people doing the work are people who have the mandate of both the parties and the candidates, not anybody from outside,” he said.
Lukman said the coalition was also reaching out to additional political parties beyond the six initially involved in the discussions.
He noted that supporters of both Obi and Atiku were among those who had signed the G-100’s open letter calling for opposition unity, but insisted that individual political ambitions must not undermine the effort.
The former political party official also cited comments by Catholic cleric John Cardinal Onaiyekan on Channels Television, arguing that opposition candidates could not divide the votes among themselves and still expect to defeat the APC.
“The arithmetic is simple: you can’t split votes five ways and expect victory in one of you,” he said.
Parties to Agree on Common Policy Agenda
On how the proposed alliance would reconcile differences among the opposition parties, Lukman said the objective was not to merge their entire manifestos but to develop a common minimum programme of action.
He said the programme would identify priority policies that any candidate emerging from the alliance would be expected to implement if elected.
The process, he added, would ensure that candidates accepted the agreed priorities before the consensus candidate was selected.
“It’s not harmonising manifestos, it’s basically to come up with a minimum programme of action which the government to be produced post-2027 will prioritise implementing,” Lukman said.
He cited differences over economic policies, including the Social Democratic Party candidate’s proposal for a starting petrol pump price of ₦300 per litre, as an example of issues the parties might need to address.
However, he expressed confidence that developing a common agenda would be manageable because the presidential campaigns had already worked on their respective policy proposals.
Lukman said the eventual consensus candidate could emerge from the African Democratic Congress, another participating party or a new political platform formed through an alliance.
“It could be ADC, it could be any other party, or it could be an alliance that will produce a new party,” he said.
Lukman Rules Out Personal Ambition
Lukman dismissed suggestions that he was pursuing personal political ambitions through the coalition-building initiative, saying he had no intention of seeking an elective or appointive position.
“I don’t have ambition to contest election and I don’t have ambition to hold any appointive or elective office,” he said.
He also explained his earlier withdrawal from the ADC, attributing the decision to internal issues in Kaduna State.
He said he had since returned to the party but remained concerned that it could reproduce the same problems associated with established political parties.
“I was concerned that we were shifting to a direction where we will end up reproducing the old parties we have left,” he said.
The opposition alliance initiative emerged from efforts to unite opposition forces following an all-opposition summit in Ibadan in April 2026, where participants resolved to pursue a common presidential candidate against the APC.
With the 2027 election approaching, the parties face the challenge of reconciling competing ambitions, agreeing on a shared policy agenda and convincing their supporters to back a single candidate in the contest against Tinubu.
