The Democracy Watch Initiative (DWI) has rejected claims by Dr Umar Ardo that Northern Nigeria has been marginalised under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, insisting that the region will support the President’s re-election bid in the 2027 presidential election.
DWI also dismissed Ardo’s prediction that Tinubu could secure less than 10 per cent of the northern vote in 2027, describing the projection as unsubstantiated and politically motivated.
In a statement issued by the Deputy National Chairman of DWI, Hon. Musa Adam, was reacting to an interview granted by Ardo on Frontline, a radio programme in Ogun State, which was subsequently reported by ThisDay.
DWI called on northern voters and Nigerians generally to reject what it described as the politics of division, blackmail and unsubstantiated statistics ahead of the 2027 elections.
Adam said DWI considered Ardo’s assertions an attempt to create unnecessary alarm and exploit regional sentiments for political purposes.
Adam said: “We dismiss that interview in its entirety as the bitter lamentation of a serial political failure, a man whose only remaining relevance is unnecessary alarmism and self-serving propaganda.
“Dr. Umar Ardo is in no moral or political position to speak for the North. He is a failed politician who has been rejected repeatedly by the very people he now claims to represent. In his own Adamawa State, for example, his governorship ambition collapsed woefully in 2023.
“He was roundly defeated at the polls. A man who could not win his own state, who could not deliver his own ward and LGA, has no right to tell northerners how and who to vote. Dr Ardo’s political career is a case study in opportunism and serial defection. In the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), he contested the governorship primaries multiple times and failed.”
He also criticised Ardo’s political history, accusing him of repeatedly changing political parties in search of relevance.
According to him, Ardo contested governorship primaries under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), later joined the All Progressives Congress (APC), returned to the PDP and subsequently moved to the Social Democratic Party (SDP).
He further dismissed the League of Northern Democrats (LND), associated with Ardo, describing it as lacking the electoral influence to determine the political choices of northern voters.
Adam also rejected Ardo’s allegation that the Tinubu administration had “Yorubanised” federal appointments and favoured the South-West.
He said: “The North remains fully represented at the highest levels: the Vice President, Senator Kashim Shettima; the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu,; ministers of strategic ministries are from the North; and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abbas. Critical parastatals and security institutions have northerners in key positions.
“Federal character is being observed, and the North is not excluded. His allegation that releases of funds to ministries were tied to regions is unsubstantiated and deliberately misleading. Budget releases follow due process, project readiness and statutory allocations and not primordial identities. If Ardo has verifiable figures, let him publish them. But he has none. What he has is a bitterness that has consumed him since his electoral defeats.
“The North is witnessing federal projects, agricultural interventions, security operations, road and rail infrastructure, and social investment programmes under the Renewed Hope Agenda. These are not southern projects; they are Nigerian projects, and the North is a major beneficiary.
“His attempt to drag Kwara and Kogi into North-South is another diversion. The North Central is part of the North, and northerners are not so gullible as to be divided by a man who has never won an election. Ardo’s prediction that Tinubu will get less than 10 per cent of northern votes is a hallucination born of frustration.
“In 2023, President Tinubu won several northern states. In 2027, northerners will consolidate their support for him because they have seen a President who is resetting Nigeria’s economy for the better. The removal of the fuel subsidy, the unification of exchange rates, tax reforms, student loans, the Compressed Natural Gas initiative, and massive infrastructure investment are painful but necessary reforms that will benefit the North and the entire country.
“Northerners are not sheep. They cannot be herded by a man who has been rejected at the polls. They will not take instructions from a serial defector who has spent his career switching parties and losing elections. Dr. Ardo should face his own political irrelevance and stop insulting the intelligence of northern voters.
“The DWI calls on all well-meaning northerners and Nigerians to reject the politics of division, blackmail and false statistics being peddled by Dr. Umar Ardo. The North is ready to support President Tinubu to consolidate on his Renewed Hope reforms that are resetting Nigeria’s economy for the better. Ardo’s 10 per cent fantasy will remain what it is: a fantasy.”