A political youth wing of Northern extraction reveals that it is mobilizing youthful voters from the 19 states in the region to vote massively for Atiku Abubakar in the 2027 presidential election in order to oust incumbent President Bola Ahmed Tinubu who they regard as an anti-North ruler
By Udoka Ekeleme, Abuja
The Northern Youths Democratic Movement (NYDM) has vowed it would work tirelessly to ensure that former Vice President Atiku Abubakar would defeat President Bola Ahmed Tinubu during the presidential election of 2027. The group alleged that it carried out discreet investigation which revealed that Atiku won the presidential election of 2019 against former President Mohammadu Buhari, but was rigged out by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) at the time because power brokers in the North had decided that Buhari should complete eight years.
Going further, the NYDM also alleged that available data it gathered from credible sources revealed to it that majority voters across the country favoured the presidential ambition of Peter Obi at the 2023 presidential election which the group alleged that the latter won landslide, but was again rigged out in favour of the incumbent President Tinubu.
In a “Letter of Protest” the NYDM sent to this medium via an email, it raised a number of issues which it said Atiku needed to address if he wanted to dislodge Tinubu in 2027. The group advised Atiku and Obi not to run on different platforms because that would give the INEC another opportunity to rig the 2027 presidential election in favour of Tinubu. The group regretted that both Obi and Atiku ran separately in 2023 which divided their votes, and gave INEC the leeway to manipulate the process which the courts validated.
The NYDM is opposed to the Coastal Highway project of the Tinubu government. It claimed that it would take more than 15 years for the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway to be completed, adding that the N16 trillion road project may be abandoned because Tinubu government cannot complete it even if he ruled for eight years. According to the group, the highway project was initiated in favour of the South west, while other regions of the country do not have such projects allocated to them. It also accused Tinubu of nepotism and running regional administration with the Yoruba calling the shots.
“Tinubu government is nothing but a regional administration which, if allowed to remain for another four years from 2027, will lead to the collapse of the country. For example, the so-called Coastal Highway cannot be completed even in the next 15 years, this means other administration will abandon it. In the end, the road will only end in the South west. This is Tinubu government’s ploy to rob other regions and favour the South west”, the group alleged.
The protest letter of the NYDM which was signed by its National Coordinator, Dr. Abdullahi Yusuf and the National Secretary, Ahmed Sirajo, from its office in Abuja, accused Tinubu of mismanaging the resources of the country in favour of his South west region. “It doesn’t matter what Dave Umahi the Minister of Works is saying, the Coastal Highway never passed through any due process, and it was awarded to a company where the president has interest to the detriment of other regions. That project cannot go beyond the South west region before Tinubu leaves government even in eight years if he wins in 2027. That project is condemnable because you cannot find its replication in other parts of the country”.
The NYDM accused Tinubu of playing politics with the insecurity that is ravaging the Northern region. It said another term of four years for Tinubu would result in terrorists’ groups taking over the North, killing and maiming citizens with reckless abandon. For the escalating rate of insecurity in the North, the NYDM said it would ensure that Tinubu never won a second term which it insists would be harmful to the region.
“We have never seen this rate of insecurity in the country before, especially in the Northern region. People are being killed every day, yet the government is busy playing politics with people’s lives. Can the country survive another four years of Tinubu government?
“The rate of insecurity in the North has shown how insensitive this government is towards the protection of lives and property. And we can no longer tolerate it because it is endangering the wellbeing of the people of the North. Tinubu is a failed leader. Kindly communicate our view to your audiences”.
On why it is solidly behind the Atiku mandate of 2027, the NYDM stated that in light of what it referred to as the collapse of security and the economy under the current administration, the unwritten North-South presidency rotation holds no water. Hence Atiku and Obi, it noted should be encouraged to run together since the former had pledged to lead for one term of four years. It noted that the North-South presidency rotation was violated in 2011 due to the death of former President Umar Musa Yar’Adua which gave Goodluck Jonathan the opportunity to run and win the presidential election of 2011. In the estimation of the group, the unwritten rotation was not sacrosanct any longer.
“Atiku is going to be the next President of Nigeria, Insha Allah. We are supporting Atiku and Obi to run a joint ticket to oust Tinubu because the rotational presidency had ceased to hold water since 2011 due to the death of former President Umar Musa Yar’Adua. The rotation was disregard due to the death. In 2027, it can also be disregarded because of Tinubu’s misrule. The rotation was not cast in stone such that even when the country is being misruled or in leadership crisis as we have today, we will close our eyes and allow the misrule to continue. Democracy is built on trust, but this administration has obviously destroyed our economy without any visible effort to rebuild it.
“Here is a government that said if it removed subsidy on fuel it would have enough money to build infrastructure. But its notable signature has remained unbridled borrowing which the Senate continues to support. Where are the savings from the fuel subsidy removal?”
The Northern Youths pleaded with Atiku to honour his pledge to rule for only one term if he succeeds Tinubu in 2027, but also begged Obi to bury his ambition in 2027 and pair with Atiku, a joint ticket the NYDM said is the only one that can remove Tinubu from office in 2027.
“From our investigation, we have discovered that Atiku won the presidential election of 2019. But they rigged him out. The North wanted to allow Former President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his eight years, but voters said otherwise and voted Atiku instead. INEC manipulated the process with the emergence of Buhari that year.
“In 2023, Obi was winning the presidential election until INEC, again, manipulated the process to declare Tinubu the winner. We knew what happened in 2023 through our discreet investigation that Obi won that election with wide margin.
“So, we’re begging Obi to jettison his ambition for 2027 and pair with Atiku. We the Northern youths will mobilize voters for them in the entire Northern region to defeat Tinubu.
“If both agree to swallow their pride and run on a joint ticket, their votes will overwhelm INEC that it will not be able to manipulate the process as with 2019 and 2023.
“We equally plead with the Igbo youths to understand that it will favour their region in 2031 if they will support an Atiku-Obi presidential ticket in 2027 to wrest power from Tinubu”.
The national Coordinator of NYDM, Dr. Yusuf, warned INEC to desist from manipulation of any kind in 2027 presidential election if it does not want to tear the country apart, stating thus, “INEC must be made to understand that the presidential poll of 2027 will be a deciding factor as to whether we want democracy or not. Any attempt by the electoral umpire to rig the election in favour of the ruling party will meet with equal resistance.
“The charade called presidential election of 2023 must be avoided by INEC in 2027 if it does not want to set this country on fire. We the NYDM have taken a solid and definite stand to vote our own choice, which is Atiku Abubakar. We hereby plead with the electoral umpire to do the needful and allow our votes to count, or we will resist any move to steal our votes come 2027”.
The angst of the Northern regions against Tinubu government continues to fester on daily basis. This can be proved by the number of political bigwigs from the North flocking into the African Democratic Congress (ADC) to join the Atiku-led coalition of anti-Tinubu politicians who have vowed to end what they refer to as the incumbent president’s autocratic rule come 2027.
Only recently, the Vice President, Kashim Shettima had tacitly criticized the imposition of Emergency Rule in Rivers State, where Tinubu inexplicably and acting ultra-vires the Constitution dislodged democratically elected government in the state and imposed a Sole Administrator to oversee the affairs of the state. Tinubu had suspended the elected governor of Rivers State, Siminalayi Fubara, and the State’s House of Assembly and brought in Ibok-Ete Ibas to superintend the affairs of the state for an initial six months since March 18, 2025.
While speaking at a book launch in Abuja recently, Shettima dropped the bombshell that no president has the legal authority to suspend even an elected Councilor. Political pundits agreed that Shettima’s outburst reflected the stand of the Northern regions against the removal of an elected governor and members of the State House of Assembly, and the imposition of a Sole Administrator.
On his part, the 2023 presidential candidate of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), Rabiu Kwankwaso, has equally accused President Tinubu administration of sidelining the northern region, alleging that national resources are being disproportionately channeled towards developing the South west, the President’s home region.
Speaking in Kano on Thursday, July 24, 2025, during the Kano State Stakeholders’ Dialogue on the 2025 Constitutional Amendment, the former governor of the State accused Tinubu government of marginalizing the North. Before now, the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) had lured Kwankwaso into defecting to the party. But to register the Northern Nigeria’s unity against Tinubu’s second term ambition, Kwankwaso said, “Let me advise the Federal Government on the distribution of federal resources. From the information available to us, it’s like most of the national budget is now tilting in one direction in this country.
“Let me advise those who are struggling by all means to take everything to remember that some of the issues that we have in this part of the country today have to do with the lack of enough resources and mismanagement of the little that comes in.
“That is why we have insecurity, we have poverty and so on. It is happening here mainly, but like a desert, it would go everywhere.
“Yesterday, I was to come by air, but unfortunately, my airline decided to shift our takeoff from 3pm to 8pm. I had to come by road. From Abuja to Kaduna to Kano was a hell. Terrible. Very bad road. This is a road started many years ago, right from the beginning of the leadership of the APC.
“Now, we are told that there is a road from the South to the East. We support infrastructure anywhere in this country, and any other thing that is good for the masses but a situation where government is taking our resources and dumping it in one part of the country and other parts of the country are left just like that, I don’t believe that is the right thing to do by the government itself.
“This is the time for the government to change, to convince our people that the government is not just on one side of the country”.
Corroborating the NYDM’s stand on Atiku must be president agenda, a former Ambassador to Switzerland, Alhaji Yahaya Kwande, claimed that the Atiku presidential mandate had been overdue. Kwande said the envy of the political elite had been responsible for the failure of Atiku to have ruled the country. He also claimed that the former Vice President had won a presidential election before but was robbed because of the envy.
In a recent interview with the Trust TV, Kwande insisted that Atiku has won favour of the electorate but had issue with the Northern political elite who envy him because of the vast wealth available to him. But Kwande believes that 2027 will be ripe for the actualization of the Atiku presidency.
“He (Atiku) has won an election that was taken away from him, I believe so. Atiku’s problem is not the masses; it’s not the voters of Nigeria. He is a child that his colleagues hate-those in the upper class of Nigeria, particularly Northerners. Northerners are so jealous of that man’s success that they usually block him at the eve of success” Kwande had said.
A media mogul, Dele Momodu, also believes that the Atiku presidential mandate can be achieved by 2027 through the ballot box. Momodu argued that the rotational presidency between the North and South was not sacrosanct, but if the North which boasts of producing huge amount of votes decides to go with Atiku in place of Tinubu, zoning should be discarded. Momodu was reacting to an earlier statement made by a People’s Democratic Party (PDP) chieftain, Olabode George to the effect that the presidency should remain in the South come 2027.
He stressed that should the North which produces larger number of votes than the South decide to go for Atiku, regional rotation of presidency would remain meaningless.
Momodu: “This (2027) is not about zoning; it’s about numbers. The North has 19 states, the South has 17. You can’t ignore the arithmetic. If a Northerner like Atiku has the numbers and Nigerians vote for him, so be it. Democracy is about majority rule, not regional rotation”.
On his part, President Tinubu who has realized what can be referred to as the Atiku influence in the North in the forthcoming presidential election, is leaving no stones unturned in his efforts to share the Northern region’s votes with his political arch rival. In view of the foregoing, he has begun to curry the favour of the North by dishing out appointments to some prominent citizens in the region in order to pacify the voters.
One of such appointments is that given to the son of a former military ruler, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida. Tinubu appointed Mohammad Babangida, a 53 years old son of the retired General Babangida as the Chairman of the revamped Bank of Agriculture. The recent appointments made by President Tinubu which mainly targeted citizens of the Northern region, has been interpreted as a move to woo the perceived angry region to vote for him in 2027.
