Former Director-General of the Progressives Governors Forum, Salihu Lukman, has said opposition parties seeking to unseat the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) may not settle on a consensus presidential candidate until a few days before the 2027 general election.
Lukman, convener of the political pressure group G-100, said the parties were committed to negotiations aimed at preventing a division of opposition votes and improving their chances of defeating President Bola Tinubu.
Speaking on Channels Television’s Hard Copy on Saturday, he expressed confidence that the parties would eventually agree on a common candidate despite lingering disagreements and a lack of trust among their leaders.
“I can tell you categorically, and my confidence about that comes from what I see in the leadership of the parties: they are committed and they are working, taking all the steps necessary,” he said.
According to him, the announcement could come months, weeks or even days before the election, when the parties would present a common direction for their supporters.
“So it could be two months, some weeks to the election, or a few days to the election, they will come out and tell Nigerians this is the direction, and everybody will queue,” he added.
Lukman disclosed that the negotiations had expanded beyond the six political parties initially involved, with efforts being made to bring additional parties into the proposed opposition alliance.
“They are also working to expand; they are reaching out to other parties,” he said.
The G-100 emerged from efforts to unite opposition forces following an all-opposition summit in Ibadan in April 2026, where participants resolved to pursue a common presidential candidate against the APC.
Lukman said the initiative had since evolved beyond the pressure group, with political parties and their presidential candidates assuming responsibility for negotiations and efforts to build mutual confidence.
He explained that the parties had taken over the process to establish the trust required for a sustainable alliance, rather than leaving decisions in the hands of external groups.
“When the parties owned the process we had started and took it beyond, took it out of our hands and began to engage each other based on the need to develop the kind of confidence they need to trust one another,” he said.
He identified the trust deficit among opposition parties and their presidential candidates as the biggest obstacle to reaching an agreement.
Lukman said a summit held on August 31 had agreed to establish five working groups, including one responsible for determining how a consensus presidential candidate would emerge.
Under the proposed arrangement, each party would nominate representatives through its presidential candidate or party leadership in line with agreed terms of reference.
“The collegiate is basically about ensuring that both the parties and their candidates are the ones taking the decisions, and at the same time the people doing the work are people who have the mandate of both the parties and the candidates, not anybody from outside,” he said.
The former APC chieftain also warned opposition politicians against adopting rigid positions that could frustrate the negotiations, particularly amid concerns over how supporters of former Labour Party presidential candidate Peter Obi, former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and the Kwankwasiyya movement would respond if their preferred candidates were not selected.
“Taking a hardline position, a rigid position, is almost like working for the APC and the Tinubu government at this point,” he said.
He noted that many signatories to G-100’s open letter were supporters of either Obi or Atiku but said the group had consistently urged them to prioritise the country over individual political ambitions.
According to him, the group’s position has been that “the country is superior to any individual”.
Lukman also referenced a recent intervention by John Cardinal Onaiyekan on Channels Television, arguing that opposition parties could not split their votes among several presidential candidates and still expect to defeat the ruling party.
“The arithmetic is simple: you can’t split votes five ways and expect victory in one of you,” he said.
The search for opposition unity has remained a major issue ahead of the 2027 presidential election, with political parties and prominent figures exploring possible alliances amid concerns that multiple candidates could weaken the challenge to Tinubu.
Policy differences
On how the parties would reconcile their policy differences, including the Social Democratic Party (SDP) candidate’s proposal to introduce a starting petrol pump price of N300 per litre, Lukman said the objective was not to harmonise their entire manifestos but to agree on a common minimum programme of action.
He said the programme would establish the priorities that an opposition-led government would pursue if it won the 2027 election.
“It’s not harmonizing manifestos, it’s basically to come up with a minimum programme of action which the government to be produced post-2027 will prioritize implementing,” he said.
According to Lukman, the agreement would be reached before the selection of a consensus candidate, ensuring that whoever emerged would be committed to implementing the shared policy priorities.
He said all participating candidates would subscribe to the programme in advance so that there would be no dispute over its implementation if any of them became the alliance’s flagbearer.
Lukman expressed confidence that developing the programme would be relatively straightforward because the various presidential campaigns had already undertaken work on their policy proposals.
“I’m sure the Peter Obi campaign has also done some work, I am also sure Prince Adewole Adebayo and all the other candidates have also done their own work,” he said.
He maintained that the eventual consensus candidate could emerge from the African Democratic Congress (ADC), another participating party or a new political platform created through an alliance.
“It could be ADC, it could be any other party, or it could be an alliance that will produce a new party,” he said.
Lukman denies political ambition
The G-100 convener dismissed suggestions that his involvement in the coalition-building effort was motivated by a desire to secure political office.
“I don’t have ambition to contest election and I don’t have ambition to hold any appointive or elective office,” he said.
He warned that the opposition could undermine its own chances if its politicians remained committed to individual presidential ambitions at the expense of a collective strategy.
Lukman argued that, regardless of the number of candidates who entered the race, only one person would eventually emerge as president.
“Politicians can lie to themselves, and at the end of the day let the candidates continue to hang on to their candidature, at the end of the day only one person will be president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” he said.
He also addressed his earlier withdrawal from the ADC, explaining that the decision was prompted by internal issues in Kaduna State. He said he had since returned to the party.
Lukman said his concern had been that the ADC risked reproducing the same internal problems associated with established political parties that the opposition coalition hoped to displace.
He said he feared the party was “shifting to a direction where we will end up reproducing the old parties we have left”.
His comments highlight the challenges facing opposition parties as they attempt to transform discussions about a common front into a workable political alliance.
Beyond agreeing on a presidential candidate, the parties must also establish a shared policy agenda, build confidence among their leaders and secure the support of their respective constituencies if they are to mount a united challenge to the APC in 2027.
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