AfriqueCAN
The 2023 presidential candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Adewole Adebayo, says he is willing to step down his presidential ambition in the 2027 elections for a better politician to emerge as the flag bearer of his party.
The lawyer stated this on the Sunday edition of Inside Sources with Laolu Akande, a socio-political programme aired on Channels Television.
“Everybody knows that I have an aspiration. I’m working on it but God is the author of tomorrow; we don’t even know who is going to be around in 2027,” Adebayo said.
“It is my prayer to God that if there is a person who God thinks is better than me to fix the problem of Nigeria, my ambition should not stop that person because we want a country that works. That is the kind of thing we are working on at this time.”
Adebayo said the SDP would give Nigerians a candidate that all citizens would be proud of and be ready to give a chance to unseat President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the next presidential election.
The politician said the SDP won’t divide Nigerians along the delicate lines of religion and ethnicity.
He said, “What used to be an easy discussion – with religion and ethnicity – has become explosive now. So, we will not use the SDP forum to try to bifurcate our people into different zones.
“What we are looking for now is a system where when we make a choice in the SDP, there will be resounding joy outside the SDP and Nigerians will say: ‘Okay, finally, this platform has given the country a chance’.”
Ahead of the 2027 polls, talks about an inter-party alliance reached a climax on Thursday, March 20, 2025, when opposition arrowhead Atiku Abubakar, alongside former Anambra governor Peter Obi, ex-Kaduna governor Nasir El-Rufai, amongst others, announced a coalition to oust incumbent Tinubu whose administration has been accused of mismanaging the economy, with all-time high inflation and unprecedented cost of living.
The coalition is banking on the numerical strength of the votes recorded by Atiku and Obi in the last poll. In 2023, Atiku of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party’s Obi came second and third respectively with combined votes of over 12 million, more than four million above the total votes recorded by Tinubu who was declared the winner by electoral umpire INEC.
With a litany of court cases arising from intra-party squabbles and protracted leadership crises rocking the PDP and the LP, as well as alleged maltreatment of some APC members, politicians in the three parties seem to have made the SDP a darling.
Already, El-Rufai and some of his foot soldiers have joined the SDP. There have been talks about Atiku and Obi reportedly making moves to join the SDP but both politicians have not made such a decision known officially.
Adebayo said the SDP is open to all interested persons but the party would disinfect all newcomers so that they won’t pollute the party with the contaminants of where they are coming from.
He said, “If you want to come to the SDP, you have to make sure that you allow us to apply disinfectant, not because we don’t respect you but because you are coming from a highly infected zone.
“The same way we did it during COVID, when you go to your friend’s house. If you love your friend, he will disinfect you so that you don’t infect others.
“We’ll do it with order. Our party’s constitution is well-sanitised. The party’s guidelines are well-sanitised. Chapter 2 of the constitution around which we are organised to render services to the Nigerian people, the quality of leadership that we want, the processes untainted by criminality, bribery, excessive use of money, the notion of ethnicity, religionism and all of that.
“They (the newcomers) told us the calamity they were facing where they were coming from. Each of them talks about injustice. When Peter Obi left PDP, he said there was criminality and injustice there. El-Rufai is not shy about his calamity; how they (APC members) embarrassed him and how they were to give him a position and they stole it from him in a disrespectful way and other things like that.
“Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has his issues about how he ran and some people in his party did not support him.
“We sympathise with everyone who is coming, we know they’ve gone through a lot of trauma but our job is to say: whatever your job is, leave it at the door because this political party is not about politicians; it’s about the Nigerian people.
“Registration for membership is done at your ward level. So, it is up to every member to read the constitution of the party.”
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