According to Nasir El-Rufai, a former governor of Kaduna State, President Bola Tinubu and his allies will learn their lessons in 2027.
El-Rufai claimed that northern governors’ attempts to guarantee Tinubu’s election as president in 2023 had been thwarted.
The former FCT Minister stated in an interview with Arise News that Tinubu and his “puppeteers” now believe they could have won the 2027 election without the assistance and backing he and other Northern governors gave them.
One among those who backed Tinubu was El-Rufai.
Tinubu, the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress, or APC, did not participate in any debates before the election.
El-Rufai responded as follows when asked whether there was anything about the former senator that he felt set him apart from the others and convinced him to have his full support in 2022:
As Northern APC governors, our first worry was that the South should gain power following eight years of Buhari. We thought that our party had such an understanding.
“We’re part of the formation of the party, and we felt that that was an honorable thing that must be upheld. So that was the first step.
“So we didn’t start by saying we want A or B to be president. We just said, look power should go to the south. That was the first step.
“The second step is now that power has gone to the South. Who do we support that we think will have a chance of winning?
“You want to be the party in power because you want your party to win. Bola Tinubu benefited from the many considerations that went into that, but we didn’t begin by endorsing a candidate. No, no, no.
And I would want to state that the outcome of the primaries and the election depended heavily on the backing of the governors of the North West, North East, and North Central.
Naturally, the puppeteers of Bola Tinubu are now disputing that. They are saying a variety of things, and in 2027, they will realize their mistake.
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