Citizen Bolaji O. Akinyemi
The open letter addressed to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu by six governorship aspirants of the All Progressives Congress in Oyo State is more than an internal party complaint. It is a political distress signal. It is a warning from within the family house that the cracks are widening, and that if care is not taken, the same mistakes that cost the party victory in 2023 may again consume its chances in 2027.
The signatories, among them former Deputy Governor H.E. Engr. Rauf Aderemi Olaniyan, Barrister Akeem Agbaje, and others, are not merely protesting personalities. They are questioning a political culture. Their central argument is simple: a governorship ticket imposed through manipulation, manufactured endorsements, and elite arrangements cannot produce genuine electoral victory.
For President Tinubu, this letter deserves more than routine political attention because it touches the very foundation upon which the APC was built. The APC emerged as a coalition driven by internal negotiations, ideological accommodation, and broad-based consultations. It was never designed to become a machine where a few power brokers stage-manage outcomes while party members merely endorse predetermined decisions.
The anxiety expressed by these aspirants is particularly important when viewed against the background of Oyo State politics. Oyo is not Lagos. Its political behavior has historically resisted arrogance, entitlement, and imposed authority. The state has repeatedly demonstrated a willingness to punish political parties perceived to be disconnected from grassroots realities.
That is why the reference to the 2023 governorship election in the letter is significant. Many APC members in Oyo still believe the party lost, not necessarily because it lacked strength, but because internal divisions, unresolved grievances, and dissatisfaction over candidate emergence weakened the party before it even entered the general election battlefield.
The fear now is that history may be preparing to repeat itself.
At the center of the controversy is the issue of “consensus.” Consensus itself is not alien to Nigerian politics or even to the APC tradition. In many cases, it has served as a stabilizing mechanism to reduce destructive primaries and preserve party unity. However, consensus only works where there is legitimacy, fairness, broad consultation, and voluntary acceptance among aspirants.
What the Oyo aspirants are rejecting is not consensus in principle, but consensus by coercion. They are warning against a situation where rented crowds, selective stakeholder meetings, and orchestrated endorsements are used to create the illusion of inevitability around a preferred aspirant.
This concern becomes even more sensitive when one remembers the volatile nature of governorship primaries in Oyo State. Unlike ordinary political contests, Oyo APC primaries have often shaped the destiny of the party more decisively than the governorship election itself. A flawed primary in Oyo does not merely produce a dissatisfied aspirant; it often produces protest votes, silent sabotage, defections, voter apathy, and fragmented structures.
The real election in Oyo APC may therefore not be in 2027. It may be at the primary.
President Tinubu understands this better than most politicians in Nigeria. His political success over the years has not merely come from winning elections, but from managing political coalitions and balancing competing interests. The letter before him is therefore an opportunity to demonstrate that the APC still possesses the internal democratic character it claims to represent.
The intervention being requested by the aspirants is not extraordinary. They are asking the President to call all stakeholders and aspirants to order before tensions degenerate into irreversible fractures. Such an intervention, if done fairly, could help restore confidence among party faithful and reassure members that the process will not be hijacked by a narrow circle of political opportunists.
Beyond Oyo State, this issue speaks to a larger national problem within Nigerian political parties. Across the country, parties increasingly struggle with the contradiction between democratic rhetoric and oligarchic practices. Primaries are often manipulated. Delegates are compromised. Aspirants are pressured into withdrawals. Outcomes are negotiated before voting begins. In the end, parties enter general elections weakened by internal injustice.
No political party can continuously survive such contradictions.
The warning contained in this letter should therefore not be dismissed as the bitterness of ambitious politicians. It is a reflection of a deeper crisis within party administration in Nigeria. Where internal democracy dies, electoral credibility eventually collapses.
The APC still has time to avoid another Oyo tragedy. But time alone solves nothing. The process through which the party produces its governorship candidate will determine whether members fight together in 2027 or fight one another before the election even arrives.
If President Tinubu truly desires to reclaim Oyo State for the APC, then the pathway cannot be through imposition disguised as consensus. It must be through a transparent, inclusive, and credible primary process that allows party members to genuinely own the outcome.
Anything short of that may hand victory to the opposition long before the first ballot is cast.
Citizen Bolaji O. Akinyemi
Apostle and Nation Builder
Author of the book, Global Leadership Code
Donald J Trump; As A Case Study.
bolajiakinyemi66@gmail.com
