In a New Year dispatch titled Doomed Voyage to 2027, Tony Nnadi of the NINAS movement argues that Nigeria has lurched back into a dangerous, tribalised and regionally fractured politics that risks relapsing the country into the trauma of 1967.
Nnadi opened the year with the above stark and uncompromising charge. He frames recent party realignments and the rhetoric of political leaders as proof. According to him, Nigeria has failed to negotiate a confederal alternative. Instead, it has wandered into a hazardous path he calls Araby.
That warning has a factual backbone. Within days, there were widely reported defections of high-profile figures. These included Peter Obi and a group of senators and political operators who joined the African Democratic Congress (ADC).
Coverage shows these moves are more than cosmetic. They mark the opening of a new political bloc. This bloc will shape the run-up to 2027. It will deepen identity-driven politics if left unchecked.
Nnadi characterises the ADC influx as the rebirth of a Biafra aligned political formation. He paints the APC and PDP in equally stark civilisational colours.
APC, he says, is aligning with an all Yoruba governance apparatus. PDP under certain northern champions is adopting an aggressive islamist-infused posture.
He reserves special opprobrium for the language of conquest and the rhetoric of an expansionist northern hegemony. These are political judgements but they are rooted in real shifts of allegiance and tone across the political class.
Bala Mohammed of Bauchi continues to be a polarising voice. He has hardened his language. His posture is viewed as inflaming rather than calming national tensions by the opposition and civil society.
The governor’s recent statements and defiant posture in national debates have been seized upon by critics. They see this as evidence that northern political currents may be moving to unify an exclusive narrative of national identity.
Nnadi does not stop at diagnosis. He insists on NINAS five point proposition as the only practical escape route from national relapse.
The proposition calls for formal recognition of constitutional grievances. It includes the decommissioning of the 1999 constitution. There is also a suspension of general elections under that constitution. Additionally, it proposes a time-bound transition to regional constitutions and a renegotiated federation.
These are radical options. The ruling class will fiercely resist them. However, organised groups and movements are now debating these options openly.
Three immediate realities can be seen. First the political elite are accelerating alignments for 2027 and in doing so are weaponising identity. The resulting polarisation raises the risk of mass withdrawal from the centre and a spike in sub national agitation.
Second the rhetoric on all sides is now a strategic tool not merely marketing It can provoke violent responses if incentives for restraint are absent
Third, there is an urgent gap between alarm and policy. Few credible public plans exist to defuse the crisis. Apart from calls for talkshops and commissions, the public rightly distrusts these initiatives.
Tony Nnadi’s demand is dramatic. He wants the voyage to 2027 halted and a transition launched within the first quarter of 2026. This demand is an expression of the fear many Nigerians now feel.
If the state cannot restore confidence in inclusive governance, and there is no agreed architecture for the distribution of power, then the political realignments we now witness may harden. These realignments could turn into permanent separation.
The choice for Nigeria is stark reform or slow fracture. The coming weeks will show whether elites choose containment or escalation.
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