According to a report by Daily Post on Monday, May 11, 2026, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has explained why opposition parties in Nigeria should reconsider any move to zone their 2027 presidential ticket to the South before the primaries.
He said the issue should be approached with careful political judgment rather than being treated as an automatic rule that must be followed without examining the wider electoral picture.
In a statement issued by his spokesperson, Olusola Sanni, Atiku warned opposition politicians against accepting what he described as a self-defeating and intellectually dishonest line of argument that insists the 2027 presidential ticket must go only to the South.
He said such a position may sound appealing on the surface, but it should not be allowed to replace practical thinking about how elections are actually won in Nigeria.
He argued that while zoning within the All Progressives Congress may be understandable, especially as a way of keeping the presidency around incumbent President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, it would amount to political carelessness for the opposition to copy that logic without first weighing the realities of the political environment.
In his view, the opposition cannot afford to rely on sentiment when the contest ahead will be determined by organization, numbers, and alliance-building.
Atiku maintained that politics should be guided by strategy, broad coalitions, and strict electoral calculation, rather than emotional arguments or selective appeals to fairness.
He said any serious political movement must first study the strength of its opponents, the spread of support across the country, and the practical steps needed to build a winning structure that can stand the test of a national election.
The Atiku camp also said the moral case being pushed in support of southern zoning does not hold up when carefully examined.
It stated that some of those advancing the argument are guilty of selective memory and political convenience, especially because many of them abandoned zoning in 2011 after the death of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, but are now presenting it as though it were an untouchable political principle that must never be questioned.
While acknowledging that the Southeast has a legitimate ambition to produce a president and that the aspiration deserves serious national attention, the statement said that aspiration should not be turned into what it described as transactional political bargaining.
It stressed that national questions of power sharing should be handled in a manner that strengthens political inclusion without weakening the opposition’s chances of challenging the ruling party.
The statement ended by urging opposition leaders to concentrate on building a credible national coalition that can defeat the incumbent government instead of embracing narratives that may end up helping President Tinubu’s chances in 2027.
He said, “It is intellectually dishonest for those who enthusiastically supported a Southern presidency under Goodluck Jonathan in 2011, despite the North’s legitimate expectation under the informal zoning arrangement, to now suddenly posture as custodians of rotational justice. Principles do not become sacred only when they align with personal ambition.”……..See More
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