Babachir Lawal: Even if all 36 governors join APC, it won’t affect coalition’s momentum

Babachir Lawal, former secretary to the government of the federation (SGF), has described the endorsement of President Bola Tinubu for a second term by some governors as “immaterial”. 

Lawal spoke in an interview with the Nigerian Tribune on Sunday.

On May 22, all 22 state governors in the All Progressives Congress (APC) endorsed Tinubu as the party’s sole candidate for the 2027 presidential election.

Lawal, a member of the coalition of opposition leaders looking to displace the ruling APC, dismissed the governors’ influence.

He said the coalition is “targeting” voters, not political officeholders.

“Look, the way we are going, eventually, it is to voters at the polling booth that we will appeal, not any political party,” he said.

“Let the governors continue to defect, we don’t care. If we wake up one morning and heard that all the 36 states governors and the FCT are in APC, we don’t care.

“It is immaterial. They have only 37 votes; maybe we can add their families. Maybe you get 1000 votes. The voter is what we are targeting, and the voter is the victim of the system we are against.”

Lawal added that the coalition is “very serious” about its chances of upsetting the APC in 2027 and will soon announce its plans.

“I have been hooked up in this town for the past five months, participating in this. If I knew it wouldn’t succeed, I would be on my farm. I started farming since the season, but I stayed back. So, I must be an idiot if I leave my most important vocation to take coffee and snacks,” the former SGF said.

“Whoever says we aren’t serious doesn’t know who the people are, because they don’t know who they are, because we don’t take photographs. We don’t take minutes of meetings. We take time to make sure that information on strategies doesn’t leak.

“I am sure that is the reason for all the speculations. But I  can tell you that the coalition is very serious; we are experienced and we know what we are doing. At the appropriate time, we will go public with what we are doing.”

TheCable had reported that opposition leaders are finalising plans to adopt the African Democratic Party (ADC) as the platform to challenge the APC in the 2027 presidential election.

Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Labour Party in 2023, on Saturday, said he would contest the next election on his party’s platform, dealing a blow to the coalition’s plans.