Former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar has declared that he will contest the 2027 presidential election, insisting that Nigeria must be “rescued from the intensive care unit” where it currently lies.
Abubakar made the declaration while reacting to remarks credited to Prof. Ola Olateju of Achievers University, Ondo, who had suggested that the former vice-president was not desperate to become president.
Olateju had represented Atiku at an event in Lagos where defectors from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP) joined the African Democratic Congress (ADC).
According to Olateju, Atiku’s political focus was not on personal ambition but on ensuring a better Nigeria. But Abubakar swiftly distanced himself from those comments.
“I did not issue that statement,” Abubakar said in a telephone interview with his former media aide, Tunde Olusunle. “In this particular instance, there was no engagement with me to distil my thoughts. Prof. Olateju was not speaking for me.
“I will run in 2027. Nigeria needs to be decisively rescued from the intensive care unit it has been consigned to. The degeneration in our country—the poverty, the pain, the anguish—is unacceptable. I will be offering myself to lead the reclamation and reconstruction of our traumatised homeland.”
The former vice-president, who is currently in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), said the ADC coalition, to which he belongs, is building a mass movement that will “shock the world” and upstage the political establishment in 2027.
Atiku, who is 78 years old, has run for Nigeria’s presidency six times and was on the ballot as a candidate in 2007, 2019, and 2023. In May 2024, he vowed to “keep contesting” for the presidency as long as he remains healthy.
If successful in securing the ticket, he will be 81 years old by the time Nigerians go to the polls in 2027.