•The coalition has several top politicians as members
A former chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Biodun Olujimi, has downplayed the coalition platform under the Africa Democratic Congress (ADC) and believes the party does not have the clout to defeat incumbent President Bola Tinubu in the 2027 election.
Olujimi, who recently left the opposition PDP for the All Progressives Congress (APC), believes the ADC is not well-oiled to dislodge the ruling party at the ballot.
“ADC could not have worked for me. All the leaders there are my friends and my leaders. But it is not properly anchored. The structures are not there. I had thought that if there would be a coalition, the coalition would be in the PDP, where the structures were very distinct and clear,” the former Senate minority leader said last night on Channels TV.
“But nothing like that happened. I would now go from number two to number five and then start looking for structures at the unit level, at the ward level, at the local government level, and at the state level, when the primaries for the presidential election are just around the corner,” she added.
On July 1, members of the coalition, including a former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar; former governor of Rivers, Rotimi Amaechi; forme Interior Minister, Rauf Aregbesola; a former Senate President, David Mark, and Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate in the 2023 election, Peter Obi, among other bigwigs, adopted the ADC as its platform for the 2027 poll.
The party picked Mark as its interim national chairman and Aregbesola as secretary, pledging to rally Nigerians to unseat President Tinubu in 2027.
Despite the calibre of persons in the ADC, Senator Olujimi said the party would not have been the right place for her to team up with.
“So, for me, it was a no-no,” the former PDP chieftain said when asked if she had considered the ADC.
She argued that it was better to leave the PDP than stay in the party and work for the APC.
