2027: Beyond Survival - Why the Downtrodden Should Look to ADC and Atiku Abubakar for a New Nigeria

                                          

Atiku Abubakar

Nigeria’s 2027 presidential election should not be treated as another routine contest for political power. It should be a national referendum on the direction of the country: the direction of our economy, democracy, education, security, federalism and, most importantly, the welfare and dignity of the Nigerian people.

The central question is simple:

After years of APC government, and particularly after the first years of the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration, is Nigeria moving towards a country in which the ordinary citizen can live with dignity, security and hope?

There is no doubt that the Tinubu administration inherited serious economic problems. There is also a legitimate argument for some of the reforms it introduced, especially the attempt to eliminate distortions in the fuel-subsidy and foreign-exchange regimes. The government itself has defended the reforms as necessary for long-term economic stability.

But political leadership must ultimately be judged by consequences.

And for millions of Nigerians, particularly the downtrodden, the consequences have been devastating: high living costs, expensive transportation, unaffordable food, pressure on family incomes, difficulties in accessing education and healthcare, unemployment and continuing insecurity.

The question for 2027 is therefore not whether APC can explain its reforms.

It is whether Nigerians should accept another four years of the same direction—or choose a fundamentally different approach.

That is where the African Democratic Congress (ADC) and Atiku Abubakar deserve serious consideration.

THE APC REFORM PARADOX: WHEN REFORM BECOMES ANOTHER BURDEN ON THE POOR

The most consequential Tinubu economic decision was the removal of petrol subsidy.

The administration argued that the subsidy had become unsustainable and that its benefits were captured disproportionately by wealthy interests, smugglers and rent-seekers. President Tinubu’s July 2023 address explicitly defended the removal on those grounds and promised that the savings would be redirected into infrastructure, education, healthcare and employment.

There is a strong economic argument for eliminating an opaque subsidy system.

But there is another question that must be asked:

What kind of subsidy should a government remove, and what kind should it retain?

Atiku’s answer is different.

His position has been that the problem was not simply the existence of intervention but the structure of the intervention.

He proposed a gradual approach, strengthening domestic refining and redirecting support towards Nigerian production rather than perpetuating a system in which public resources could facilitate import-dependent rent seeking. In his 2024 explanation of what he would have done differently, he argued for attention to Nigeria’s refining infrastructure and proposed that Nigeria should refine a substantial proportion of its crude domestically.

This provides the basis for what is now being presented by his camp as a production-based subsidy model.

The principle is profound:

If Nigeria must subsidise anything, let the subsidy follow the Nigerian barrel to a Nigerian refinery - not the imported product through an opaque importation chain.

That distinction is critical.

A subsidy paid to importers can become a subsidy to middlemen.

A carefully designed subsidy attached to domestic crude supplied to domestic refineries, with strict verification and fiscal limits, can instead become an instrument of industrial policy and consumer protection.

The emerging Atiku proposal has been described as targeted support for Nigerian crude supplied to domestic refineries within a capped, budgeted and independently audited framework.

This is what I would call the welfare economics of production.

It attempts to achieve three things simultaneously:

reduce the cost of fuel;

support domestic refining;

and protect the Nigerian consumer.

And that is fundamentally different from simply saying: remove subsidy and allow the market to determine everything.

ATIKU’S WELFARE PHILOSOPHY: PROTECT THE CITIZEN WHILE REFORMING THE ECONOMY

This is perhaps the most important distinction Nigerians should examine.

Atiku’s position is not necessarily an argument against reform.

It is an argument for reform with a human face.

In his post-2023 explanation of his alternative approach, he specifically advocated a gradualist approach to subsidy reform and a robust social-protection programme to help poor Nigerians navigate the cost-of-living consequences of reform. He proposed using savings to strengthen infrastructure, education, healthcare, rural infrastructure, agriculture and youth skills.

This suggests a welfareist conception of economic reform:

Government should not ask citizens to endure pain today merely because prosperity may arrive tomorrow without providing mechanisms to protect them during the transition.

That is a particularly important lesson for Nigeria.

The poor cannot eat GDP growth.

The unemployed graduate cannot pay rent with foreign reserves.

The market woman cannot feed her children with an improved credit rating.

The farmer cannot cultivate his farm with macroeconomic stability alone.

Economic reform must eventually translate into human welfare.

THE BORDER QUESTION: SECURITY, TRADE AND THE ORDINARY NIGERIAN

Another area that deserves greater attention in Atiku’s programme is border reform.

Nigeria’s borders are not simply geographical lines. They are economic and security institutions.

Poorly managed borders facilitate:

* smuggling;

* trafficking;

* arms movement;

* illegal migration;

* revenue leakage;

* distortion of domestic production;

* and insecurity.

But properly managed borders can also facilitate legitimate regional trade and strengthen Nigeria’s position within ECOWAS.

Atiku has specifically identified improved border control as part of a broader security and conflict-resolution strategy, alongside diplomacy, intelligence, traditional institutions and good neighbourliness.

This is important because border policy should not simply mean closing borders.

It should mean intelligent borders.

The objective should be to distinguish between legitimate commerce and criminal activity.

The Nigerian trader should be able to conduct legitimate cross-border business.

The smuggler should not.

The farmer should benefit from a domestic market protected against destructive illegal imports.

The criminal network should encounter a technologically capable and professionally coordinated border system.

The border, therefore, should become both a security instrument and an economic instrument.

EDUCATION: SHOULD WE REDUCE THE COST OR MAKE THE STUDENT BORROW?

This is another area in which the philosophical difference between APC/Tinubu and Atiku deserves national debate.

The Tinubu administration has made student loans a prominent element of its response to higher-education financing. Indeed, Tinubu’s 2023 broadcast explicitly linked subsidy savings to making education more affordable and providing loans to students who needed them.

But here is the question:

Is education genuinely affordable because a student can borrow money to pay for it?

A loan can provide access.

But a loan is still a liability.

A young Nigerian who graduates with debt has not necessarily escaped poverty. He may simply have postponed the burden.

This is where Atiku’s emerging education position offers a different philosophy.

His camp has argued that government should focus on reducing the underlying cost of education rather than simply financing students to meet increasingly expensive educational bills. It has also indicated that qualifying existing student debts could be considered for forgiveness under an Atiku administration.

The philosophical distinction is therefore clear:

APC/Tinubu approach:

Help the student pay the cost.

Atiku/ADC approach:

Reduce the cost the student has to pay in the first place.

There is an enormous difference.

If the cost of education is ₦X and government gives the student a loan to pay ₦X, the student has access - but remains indebted.

If government reforms the system so that the cost becomes substantially lower, the student has access without necessarily beginning adult life under a debt burden.

That is why the statement that “education should open doors, not mortgage the future” captures an important welfare principle in the emerging Atiku position.

FROM SUBSIDY TO EDUCATION: THE SAME WELFARE PHILOSOPHY

There is actually a connection between the two policies.

Fuel subsidy reform and education financing are not separate questions.

Both ask who bears the cost of national development.

Should the burden fall disproportionately on the citizen?

Or should government design policy to protect vulnerable citizens while creating the conditions for long-term productivity?

A production-linked fuel intervention seeks to lower energy and transportation costs.

Lower transportation costs affect food distribution.

Lower logistics costs affect agricultural prices.

Lower energy costs affect businesses.

Lower business costs can encourage production and employment.

And lower education costs reduce the financial burden on families.

This is why Atiku’s welfare posture should not be dismissed as mere “palliative politics.”

It can be understood as an attempt to make economic reform socially sustainable.

THE 2023 POLICY DOCUMENT: A WINDOW INTO THE 2027 ATIKU PRESIDENCY

Perhaps one of the strongest arguments for Atiku in 2027 is that Nigerians do not have to guess entirely what an Atiku presidency might look like.

His 2023 policy document provides a reference point.

It may not remain unchanged. Circumstances have changed dramatically since 2023, and any serious presidential candidate should update his programme to reflect Nigeria’s present realities.

But the philosophy and policy architecture are already visible.

Atiku’s 2023 programme emphasised:

* private-sector-led economic growth;

* investment and infrastructure;

* education;

* healthcare;

* employment;

* poverty reduction;

* security;

* devolution of powers;

* restructuring;

* improved governance;

* public-sector reform;

* and a stronger productive economy.

His policy framework also proposed mechanisms such as an Economic Stimulus Fund for MSMEs and a private-sector-driven Infrastructure Development Fund.

This gives Nigerians something extraordinarily important in politics:

A basis for prediction.

The 2027 programme may evolve from the 2023 document, but the 2023 policy document provides the ideological and policy foundation from which Nigerians can reasonably anticipate the character of an Atiku administration.

That is why Nigerians should not wait until campaign rallies begin before asking:

What exactly will Atiku do?

Much of the answer has already been articulated.

The task now is to ask him to update it, cost it, prioritise it and make the implementation mechanisms clear for 2027.

A PRESIDENT WHO SEES GOVERNMENT AS AN ENABLER

Atiku’s economic philosophy has consistently placed emphasis on the private sector as a major engine of growth.

That is important.

Government cannot employ everybody.

Government cannot own every business.

Government cannot produce every product.

Government cannot run every enterprise efficiently.

But government can create the conditions under which Nigerians create wealth for themselves and employment for others.

The Atiku approach envisages a more liberalised economic environment, greater private-sector participation and reform of inefficient state enterprises. His earlier and 2023 policy positions also emphasised infrastructure and private-sector investment.

This is potentially powerful for the downtrodden because the best social programme is ultimately a productive economy.

A government that creates millions of productive opportunities reduces dependence.

A government that creates opportunities empowers citizens.

And an empowered citizen is less vulnerable to political manipulation.

THE DEMOCRATIC VIRTUE: LET THE PEOPLE CHOOSE

There is another reason why the Atiku/ADC proposition deserves attention.

It is the principle of democratic endurance.

Nigeria’s democracy should not be a system where the incumbent assumes that power naturally belongs to the incumbent party.

Democracy means that every election is an opportunity for the people to review government and decide whether to renew its mandate or replace it.

Atiku’s political career has included repeated presidential contests and electoral defeats without abandoning the democratic process.

That endurance has significance.

A democracy becomes stronger when politicians understand that losing an election does not mean the end of political life - and winning one does not mean permanent ownership of the state.

The democratic spirit must therefore be:

contest, persuade, serve, accept the people’s verdict and return to the people again.

ADC MUST BECOME MORE THAN AN ANTI-APC PLATFORM

This is where I believe ADC itself must rise to the occasion.

ADC should not campaign merely by saying:

“APC has failed.”

That is insufficient.

It must say:

“Here is the Nigeria we intend to build.”

It must present a clear social contract.

It must translate Atiku’s policy philosophy into measurable 2027 commitments.

It must tell Nigerians:

What will happen in the first 100 days?

What will happen in the first year?

What will happen by the end of four years?

And it must provide citizens with measurable indicators by which they can judge the government.

That is how ADC can distinguish itself from the political culture Nigerians have become accustomed to.

THE DOWNTRODDEN SHOULD NOT BE ASKED TO WAIT FOREVER

For too long, Nigeria has been told:

“The economy will improve.”

“Things will get better.”

“Be patient.”

“Endure the sacrifice.”

But there comes a point when the citizen is entitled to ask:

How long?

The downtrodden have endured enough.

The Nigerian worker deserves purchasing power.

The farmer deserves security.

The student deserves affordable education.

The entrepreneur deserves infrastructure.

The pensioner deserves dignity.

The young person deserves opportunity.

And the citizen deserves a government that recognises that economic statistics are ultimately supposed to serve human beings.

2027: FROM THE POLITICS OF PALLIATIVES TO THE POLITICS OF STRUCTURAL WELFARE

This, perhaps, is the central proposition of the Atiku/ADC project.

Nigeria needs to move from:

palliatives to productive capacity;

loans to affordable education;

import subsidy to domestic production support;

weak borders to intelligent border management;

centralisation to devolution;

government dominance to private-sector empowerment;

political patronage to opportunity;

and temporary relief to sustainable welfare.

This is why the 2027 contest should not simply be about personalities.

It should be about competing models of government.

THE FINAL CHOICE

Atiku Abubakar is not entitled to the presidency merely because he has contested before.

ADC is not entitled to Nigerians’ votes merely because it is an opposition platform.

They must earn the confidence of Nigerians.

But Nigerians, in turn, owe themselves the duty of examining alternatives seriously.

And when the 2023 Atiku policy document is placed beside his subsequent explanations of how he would have handled subsidy reform, security, border management, MSME support, infrastructure and social protection, a reasonably coherent picture begins to emerge.

That picture suggests a government that would seek to combine market-oriented economic growth with targeted social protection; domestic production with consumer welfare; federal reform with national unity; and economic liberalisation with institutional accountability.

The 2027 policies will undoubtedly need to be revised because Nigeria in 2027 will not be exactly the Nigeria of 2023.

But the philosophical foundation is already visible.

And that is perhaps what distinguishes Atiku from a candidate whose programme Nigerians have to discover afresh at every election.

We already have a window into what an Atiku government is likely to look like.

The 2023 document opened that window.

The subsequent policy explanations have widened it.

The ADC platform now provides a political vehicle through which that vision can be presented to Nigerians.

The responsibility now belongs to ADC and Atiku to turn that vision into a credible, costed, measurable and people-centred 2027 programme.

And the responsibility of the Nigerian people is equally clear:

Do not vote merely for the politician who promises to relieve your suffering for a day. Vote for the political programme that gives you the opportunity to escape the conditions that keep you poor.

That is the real meaning of political change.

That is the promise of democratic choice.

And that is why, in 2027, ADC and Atiku Abubakar deserve to be judged not simply as another opposition alternative, but as a possible instrument for rebuilding the Nigerian state around the welfare, dignity and productive power of its citizens.