2027: ADC lacks Tinubu, Buhari–calibre politicians, says Datti Baba-Ahmed

 

Former Labour Party vice-presidential candidate, Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed, has said the African Democratic Congress (ADC) does not have politicians of the calibre of former President Muhammadu Buhari or President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whom he described as resourceful, focused and master political strategists.

Baba-Ahmed warned that the ADC may disintegrate if its primary elections fail to favour some of the prominent politicians within the party.

Speaking on Channels Television on Friday, he argued that many of those now rallying around the ADC are the same political actors who helped to form the All Progressives Congress (APC) and are currently dissatisfied with their inability to secure appointments or elective offices within the ruling party.

According to him, some of the politicians had gone as far as Senate screening before turning against the APC and seeking to mobilise Nigerians under a new platform.

“I am not that gullible,” Baba-Ahmed said. “I ask questions from the beginning of their political careers to where they are today, and my answers are not favourable.”

He also criticised the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), describing it as structurally flawed and incapable of offering Nigerians a credible alternative.

“They are deceiving themselves if they think Nigerians will accept the same people again after APC,” he said. “You bring APC, then remove the ‘P’ and add a ‘D’, and expect Nigerians to fall for it.”

Baba-Ahmed maintained that the ADC lacks a unifying figure like Buhari, who once enjoyed widespread support across party lines, or a political tactician like Tinubu, whom he described as disciplined and highly strategic.

“They don’t have a Buhari in ADC. They don’t have a Tinubu — a resourceful, focused and determined master politician,” he said, adding that he was not endorsing Tinubu’s policies.

He further noted that the political conditions that enabled the 2015 coalition which brought the APC to power no longer exist.

“There was a promise Nigerians believed in then. Today, that promise is absent. The same people who brought in the APC, which Nigerians are now unhappy with, are again asking Nigerians to vote for them under ADC,” he said.