Peter Obi, Atiku Abubakar and Rabiu Kwankwaso shared the hall on Tuesday with Rotimi Amaechi and Rauf Aregbesola at the African Democratic Congress national convention inside Rainbow Events Centre, Abuja. More than 3,000 delegates watched the party, already stripped of formal recognition by the Independent National Electoral Commission because of a leadership feud between chairman David Mark and rival claimant Nafiu Bala Gombe, try to re-organise for the 2027 race. The programme, themed "So the Nation May Work", set out to heal internal rifts, elect a fresh National Working Committee and complete stalled state congresses after the party was unveiled as a coalition vehicle last July. Delegates arrived from every state under heavy security after organisers accused unnamed outsiders of blocking access to Eagle Square and the Moshood Abiola National Stadium.
A single photograph of Obi, Atiku, Kwankwaso, Amaechi and Aregbesola sitting in the same row inside a hall that seats barely 4,000 people is the clearest proof yet that the 2027 presidential contest is already being negotiated in backrooms disguised as "unity conventions".
The Independent National Electoral Commission's refusal to recognise any ADC faction matters less than the optics: five men who collectively polled over 25 million votes in 2019 now need the umbrella of a fringe party whose best governorship showing last year was 28,000 votes. Their presence turns the Mark-Gombe squabble from an internal crisis into a bidding war for who gets to keep the party structure when the coalition inevitably implodes.
For the delegate who spent two nights on a bus from Calabar, the convention means little beyond the daily allowance and a possible appointment as special assistant once the big men settle who becomes the placeholder chairman. The real ticket they are chasing is the running-mate slot, because every observer knows the ADC is merely the shell through which one of the heavyweight contenders will seek re-branding once the courts decide which faction legally owns the name.
This gathering repeats the 2013 template when APC began as a marriage of acronyms before personal ambitions shredded it; expect the same movie, only faster.
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