The All Progressives Congress (APC) has accused leading opposition figures including Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi and Rabiu Kwankwaso of grandstanding despite their roles in Nigeria’s political establishment.
APC National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka, made the remarks on Tuesday during an interview on TVC’s Beyond The Headlines.
He particularly dismissed Kwankwaso’s claim of offering Nigerians a “new direction” ahead of the 2027 general election.
Morka argued that the former Kano State governor could not present himself as an alternative to the political system because he had been part of the establishment for decades.
“Kwankwaso, a new direction to where? And I will offer an answer: a new direction to nowhere,” Morka said.
He accused Kwankwaso of contributing to the problems confronting the country, arguing that his political history made it difficult for him to claim to represent a fundamentally different direction.
“He has been and remains a part and parcel of the Nigerian establishment, so whatever is going on today, Kwankwaso was a frontline contributor to the challenges that we are facing today,” he said.
Morka also lumped Kwankwaso together with former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and NDC presidential candidate, Peter Obi, accusing the opposition figures of using political rhetoric to court Nigerians ahead of the 2027 election.
“When men like Atiku, Kwankwaso, Peter Obi, and some of these elements of the opposition come out to grandstand, I don’t need to say much because I think that Nigerians understand what they are up to,” he said.
The APC spokesman maintained that the country’s political challenges could not be blamed solely on one administration, saying successive military and civilian governments had contributed to Nigeria’s problems.
“Nigerians know that this country, over generations, was severely misgoverned, not just by the military dictatorship but by Democrats who wielded authority in this country; they didn’t serve the country well and Nigerians know that,” Morka said.
His comments came barely a day after he claimed that President Bola Tinubu had outperformed every democratically elected Nigerian president during their first terms in office.
Speaking on Channels Television on Monday, Morka said Tinubu inherited an economy that was “completely in a mess” but had significantly improved the country’s macroeconomic position through his administration’s policies.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has outperformed any president in his first term. He has outperformed any democratically elected president in this country in their terms,” he said.
Asked to provide the indicators supporting the claim, Morka said the performance indicators were self-evident.
“The indicators are res ipsa loquitur as we say in law; they speak for themselves. This president inherited an economy that was completely in a mess,” he added.
Morka attributed the economic difficulties inherited by Tinubu to what he described as failures of successive administrations, particularly the 16-year rule of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
He described former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration as a “stopgap” government that, according to him, prevented the country from deteriorating further before Tinubu assumed office.
“Buhari was a stopgap president that really came to keep the country from tipping over the precipice — from 16 years of horrific maladministration of the PDP government,” Morka said.
“President Buhari served his term, did his job to hold the country still for President Tinubu to enter.”
The APC spokesperson further claimed that Tinubu’s reforms had moved Nigeria “out of the woods” at the macroeconomic level and suggested that even some of the administration’s critics were beginning to acknowledge its achievements.