Opposition presidential hopefuls in the 2027 General Election, former Vice President and candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and ex-Anambra State Governor and candidate of Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Peter Obi, have adopted a theme that’s against the letter and spirit of the amended 1999 Constitution of Nigeria: A shortcut to the Presidency by subterfuge.

To avoid a direct challenge of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on January 16, 2027, Atiku and Obi, 2023 candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP), accordingly, have crafted a refrain of Tinubu should “resign” or “quit” the race.

Why would both, who accuse Tinubu and the APC of muscling them out of the 2027 poll, deploy the same tactic against the president? The answer and/or inference lies in the 2023 poll, when they did the unthinkable, but came short in the presidential bid.

To demonstrate his resolve to stop Tinubu from 2027, Atiku, similar to what he did in 2023, has submitted documents, via a United States-based lobbying firm he reportedly paid $1.2m, to American officials concerning a decades-old civil forfeiture case allegedly linked to Tinubu’s trafficking in drugs.

There’s nothing, during the contentious 2023 election, that the Atiku and Obi campaigns didn’t do, legal and illegal, within and outside Nigeria, to thwart the aspiration of Tinubu, then-National Leader of the APC and ex-governor of Lagos State. They abused, insulted and denigrated him, his family, friends, associates, tribe and religion

Their parties, political groups, supporters, hired journalists, writers, social media influencers, OAPs, and lawyers dug up files and records – authentic, falsified, distorted, forged or fake – to question all aspects of Tinubu’s life: citizenship, family, birth, gender, growing-up, education, jobs, business, association, politics and governance.

They raked up mud and dirt, and all manner of allegations: trivial, serious, manufactured, unverified, unsubstantiated, tainted; and accused him of parading forged certificates, and indulging in drugs trafficking, treasury looting, land-grabbing and rights violation.

They dragged him through the courts in Nigeria and in the U.S., to investigate these allegations, in hope that the courts would sanction him, no matter the unprovenness of the charges.

Atiku subpoenaed and deposed the Chicago State University (CSU) in a U.S. court, to confirm Tinubu’s attendance at the school he allegedly used a female’s identity to gain admission into, and his reported forged diploma, with his transcripts in 17 courses showing he’d 11 ‘As’, 5 ‘Bs’ and 1 ‘C’, and graduated with “Honours”.

Atiku and Obi led protests against Tinubu, blocking highways and laying siege to political and public property in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city. They reported him to, and invited the U.S., the UK, and other Western countries, and the UN, EU, AU and ECOWAS to intervene in Nigeria’s democratic system.

They pleaded with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to reopen its reported files on Tinubu’s alleged drug trafficking in the U.S., for which he’s reportedly indicted, convicted and jailed, and paid a fine of $460,000.

(Yet, as far back as February 3, 2003, over 23 years ago, a request by then-Inspector General of Police, Tafa Balogun (under then-President Olusegun Obasanjo, with Atiku as Vice President), to the U.S. Consulate in Lagos, to confirm, via the FBI, Tinubu’s alleged involvement in narcotics, his arrest, indictment, conviction and sentence, returned negative on February 4, 2003: “No criminal record, arrests, or outstanding warrants in the United States against Bola Ahmed Tinubu” in the FBI records at the National Crime Information Centre (NCIC)).

They urged the American government to arrest Tinubu any time he’s in the U.S., whether on official or private engagements. They regularly titillated the public that the FBI had reopened the “Tinubu files” or was coming to seize him for trial in America!

The Atiku and Obi’s camps marched to the Defence headquarters in Abuja, and asked the Military High Command to overthrow, even if it meant removing then-Buhari’s government from power, to prevent Tinubu from participating in the February 25, 2023, election.

If the poll held, and Tinubu won, the Military should abort his swearing-in as President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria. And if he’s sworn-in as President, his government shouldn’t take roots, but overthrown immediately.

Tinubu’s poll competitors seemed to receive a helping hand from the government or the powers-behind-the-power, known as “cabals” who influence, guide and direct what goes on at the Presidential Villa seat of government in Abuja.

First, a failed attempt, by then-APC’s National Chairman and former Nasarawa Governor Abdullahi Adamu, to foist a fait accompli on President Buhari, to endorse then-Senate President Ahmad Lawan as the party’s 2023 presidential candidate; but with mostly Northern governors, reportedly led by then-Kaduna State Governor Nasir el-Rufai, able to persuade Buhari to allow Tinubu to run, and not scuttle the APC rotation of power to Southern Nigeria from 2023 to 2031!

Second, the Buhari government’s redesign of the Naira, a few months to the poll, which then-Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Dr Godwin Emefiele, said was aimed partly at mopping up excess liquidity during the campaigns, but which polity watchers reckoned was to stop Tinubu’s alleged plot to influence and buy voters ahead of the poll.

But the government action produced consequences of unimaginable proportion: Severe disruption of the economic and social lives of Nigerians, who weren’t able to access their money in the banks, and resorted to “buying money” from currency merchants and dubious bankers at exorbitant costs, to afford bare essentials at double or triple prior prices of goods and services.

Hungry and angry customers spent hours, days and weeks at bank premises, waiting to withdraw pittance from their accounts. Many, in queues, collapsed, and several died from hunger, exhaustion or ailments due to “official hijack” of their savings in bank vaults. There’re protests against the policy, with the government delaying and/or defying a declarative order by the Supreme Court to reverse it.

The Atiku and Obi camps caricatured Tinubu as “baba wey no well,” “shaky shaky,” drugee, lame, and pants-wetter; they concocted rumours about his incapacitation, brain-dead, and actually death in overseas where he went for medical treatment; and disputed photographs he took with then-President Muhammadu Buhari, also in London for routine check-up, when he visited Tinubu.

They alleged that Tinubu travelled regularly to Europe, to replace his “pacemaker” (a small, battery-powered medical device implanted under the skin to help regulate abnormal heart rhythms) that kept/keeps him alive.

Despite these obviously sponsored and coordinated campaigns, conspiracies and propaganda in the polity, the mainstream and social media by his co-competitors, and some members of the APC-controlled government against his candidacy, Tinubu won the election by 8.7m votes to defeat Atiku, who polled 6.9m votes, by a margin of 1.8m votes, and Obi, who scored 6,101,533 votes, by a margin of 2.6m votes.

Atiku and Obi rejected the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declaration and return of Tinubu as the duly-elected President, and went to the Tribunals: Appeal Court and Supreme Court, which found their petitions, and appeals unproven and unmeritorious, dismissed them accordingly, and affirmed Tinubu as duly-elected.

Fast forward to 2026, in the lead-up to the 2027 General Election, and Atiku and Obi, their handlers and supporters have deployed the same or similar playbook of 2023, throwing muck at President Tinubu, to prevent his re-election for the final four years of an eight-year tenure (2023-2031). The problem, though, is Atiku and Obi’s adoption of a theme that’s against the letter and spirit of the amended 1999 Constitution of Nigeria: A shortcut to the Presidency by subterfuge.

LAST LINE: Part two of this copy will look at the reasons that informed Atiku and Obi’s calls for President Tinubu to resign or refrain from seeking a second term in office in 2027.

Mr Ezomon, Journalist and Media Consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria. Can be reached on X, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp @EhichioyaEzomon. Tel: 08033078357.