By Eshioromeh Sebastian
There is something profoundly melancholic about watching a man continues to chase a dream even long after the world has moved on. Yet he clings to the pretense, willfully blind to the truth that this futile campaign should have been abandoned long ago.
Kaduna’s quiet streets last week Friday, became an unlikely stage for an unusual political pilgrimage when former vice president Atiku Abubakar led a delegation of opposition leaders to former President Muhammadu Buhari’s home in Kaduna. He was accompanied on the visit by former governors Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State, Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto, Gabriel Suswam of Benue, Jibrilla Bindow of Adamawa and Achike Udenwa of Imo, among others.
Coming out from the surprise meeting, which captured the nation’s attention, given the unexpected nature of the visit to Buhari, Atiku gave the media a feeble explanation: it was merely a “post-Sallah visit.” A laughable justification. Whose idea was this? Of course, his newly acquired political mouthpiece, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, the former strongman of Kaduna.
Atiku Abubakar is, if nothing else, a serial presidential contender, a man still in pursuit of an office that has eluded him for nearly thirty years. The cameras captured handshakes, the smiles and the careful choreography of camaraderie. But behind the performance, the air carried the unmistakable scent of a fading ambition, one that refuses to accept its own expiration date.
Let us dispense with the pretence. Atiku did not visit Kaduna out of respect for Buhari. He was there because he is running out of options- he has an agenda that carries with it an ethnic colouration. The man who once declared Buhari’s administration a failure now seeks to drape himself in the former president’s influence, as though proximity alone might revive his own fading fortunes. It was no ordinary visit. It was, at its core, a desperate bid for relevance.
Close to eight years, Atiku positioned himself as Buhari’s most vocal detractor, a critic who sharpened his words like daggers. Now, in a twist that defies belief, he stands before the same man, seeking benediction. This wasn’t reconciliation – it was resurrection politics.
The North has not forgotten how Atiku Abubakar aligned with Bukola Saraki and others to isolate President Buhari within the APC, leaving him exposed to the attacks of detractors. The North recalls how he leveraged the Saraki-led National Assembly to obstruct Buhari’s Bills in several occasions. These are not wounds that heal quickly.
The North remembers Atiku’s strategic silence during Buhari’s most searing trials—the calculated distance kept, the subtle criticisms channelled through proxies. The North has not erased from its memory Atiku’s own words in 2018, when he accused Buhari of being “power-drunk,” warning that the then president would “not be ready to leave power without a fight.”
The truth is plain: Atiku is desperate. Defeated in the past decade, defeated in 2019, rejected again in 2023, he realises that his window is closing. Now, he seeks to exploit Buhari, a man he never truly supported, to salvage his fading political career. It was a pitiable spectacle.
The true architect of this charade is Nasir El-Rufai. A man who spent years denouncing Atiku as corrupt and unreliable now positions himself as his chief advocate. Why? Because El-Rufai aspires to be the North’s kingmaker. He imagines that by pushing Atiku forward, he can manipulate the political landscape to his advantage.
But Buhari is no fool. He understands this gambit. He knows Atiku and El-Rufai seek only to use him. Buhari’s relationship with Tinubu is cast on stone; he will not discard it for the sake of a staged photo opportunity.
Atiku’s career is a chronicle of betrayal. He served under Obasanjo, then turned against him. He joined the APC, only to flee back to the PDP when expedient. Even his allies distrust him—Obasanjo himself declared Atiku unfit for power, while El-Rufai once echoed those very sentiments. Now, these same figures feign support? The hypocrisy is glaring. Atiku, according to his former boss, operates without principle, guided solely by ambition. And now, that ambition renders him absurd.
He and El-Rufai seek to stoke ethnic sentiment, courting sympathy from a segment of the North. El-Rufai laid the groundwork long before his defection to the SDP.
Atiku deludes himself if he believes a common welcome by Buhari will make the North forget his past indifference. He assumes northern voters will flock to him after a single orchestrated display of camaraderie. But the North is not so easily deceived. They remember his silence when Buhari was maligned; they recall his refusal to stand beside him. Why should they now stand beside Atiku?
Buhari’s supporters are loyal, but they are not naive. They will not abandon their convictions for the sake of a man whose allegiance shifts with the political winds.
Atiku is 77 years old. His presidential ambitions stretch back to 1993. How many defeats must he endure before accepting the verdict? Nigeria does not want him. Even within his own party, faith in his leadership is fractured.
Rather than retiring with dignity, he persists in self-diminishment. Having lost to Tinubu, he now resorts to begging Buhari for endorsement. What next? Must he grovel before every potential patron? This visit was not an act of respect, nor a nod to tradition. It was desperation, pure and simple. Atiku is a sinking vessel, clutching at any lifeline. But Nigeria has tired of his machinations.
There comes a time when even the most persistent actor must exit the stage. Atiku has had his encores—more, perhaps, than he deserved. Yet with each passing year, his performance grows more strained, his audience more restless. Nigeria does not need leaders who reinvent themselves with each election cycle. It needs men who understand that true legacy is built on consistency, not convenience.
Buhari won’t save him. And Nigeria doesn’t need him. It’s over!
Eshioromeh Sebastian wrote from Abuja.
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