The National Chairman of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, has claimed that former President Muhammadu Buhari resisted pressure from some political interests to support President Bola Tinubu as his successor because he considered the prospect harmful to Nigeria.
Baba-Ahmed made the claim at a summit organised by the Northern Elders Forum, where he criticised Tinubu’s administration and urged Nigerians to oppose any attempt to place the president’s ambition for a second term above the country’s interests.
In a video of the event published on Symfoni’s YouTube channel, the PRP chairman said Nigerians should have examined the implications of Tinubu’s presidential ambition more closely when he popularised the Yoruba expression “Emilokan”, meaning “it is my turn”, during the build-up to the 2023 election.
“Even Buhari saw Tinubu as bad news for this country. In fairness to him, he is not around him. Buhari resisted some people who insisted it had to be Tinubu,” Baba-Ahmed said.
He questioned the idea of treating the presidency as an entitlement, arguing that leadership of a country with a population of about 250 million people should be based on national interest rather than an individual’s personal ambition.
“Nigerians ought to have known there was something wrong the day Tinubu said ‘It’s my turn’. Maybe we missed it,” he said.
“We have a presidency of a country of 250 million people. My turn? To do what? To become president”, he added.
Baba-Ahmed also accused the Tinubu administration of worsening the country’s difficulties and performing poorly across key areas of national development. His remarks reflected his assessment of the government’s record, rather than an independently established measure of its performance.
“Now we are being depressed for having a president for three and a half years. He has dragged the country as low as it is possible to go. And it has to stop him. We cannot go below, beyond where we are,” he said.
The PRP leader further alleged that the president was prioritising his political ambition over the welfare of Nigerians. He warned that the country’s future should not be put at risk by an individual’s determination to retain power.
“We will not allow a president to fulfil an ambition that one individual alone can wreak his country, just to prove that he has the power and the money to do so,” he said.
“We are at the bottom. There is no way to go anymore. Every index of failure shows in this administration”, he added.
Baba-Ahmed also faulted Tinubu for not personally appealing to Nigerians for another term, alleging that the president had relied on political allies to advance his re-election campaign.
He criticised governors in the North for what he described as their failure to adequately communicate the region’s economic difficulties and growing public dissatisfaction to the president.
Despite his strong criticism of the administration, Baba-Ahmed expressed confidence that Nigeria would overcome its present challenges. He cited the resilience of Nigerians during previous national crises and said the country would survive its current difficulties.
“We are very resilient people. We have seen crises bigger than this, and we survived it. We survived it, and we will survive this one.
“We will survive the four years of abuse, neglect, and plunder that Tinubu has caused because Nigeria has to survive for our children and their children”, he said.
Looking ahead to the 2027 presidential election, the PRP chairman said opposition politicians were making efforts to form a coalition capable of challenging Tinubu at the polls.
He described the discussions as an attempt to bring political groups together despite their ideological and strategic differences.
“What we have seen is an incredible willingness for politicians to come together and say, let’s put aside some of our differences and see if we can actually create a momentum strong enough to remove this Tinubu,” he said.
Baba-Ahmed said the proposed alliance would field a presidential candidate and called on Nigerians opposed to Tinubu’s re-election to support whoever emerges as its flag-bearer.
However, the coalition effort faces the task of reconciling competing political interests and agreeing on a candidate acceptable to the participating parties ahead of the 2027 general election.
Tinubu won the 2023 presidential election on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC), succeeding Buhari, who served two terms from 2015 to 2023.
Since taking office, Tinubu has introduced major economic reforms, including the removal of the petrol subsidy and changes to foreign exchange management. His administration has defended the measures as necessary to stabilise public finances, while the resulting economic pressures and rising cost of living have remained major concerns for many households.
