Mr. President,
Yesterday APC members across Nigeria affirmed you as our candidate for 2027. Barring unforeseen shocks, the odds favour your return to Aso Rock. As of a fact, I have gone past thinking about the elections but about what you do when sworn in on May 29, 2027. But winning 2027 will mean nothing if you enter your second term still chained to the same structure that has sabotaged every reform since 2010, notably the amorphous, unaccountable Nigeria Governors’ Forum.
If your first term was about removing fuel subsidy and unifying exchange rates, your second term must be about removing the governors’ stranglehold on Nigeria.
Since the Jonathan era, the Forum has abandoned any pretence of peer learning or State development. It is now a cartel. A club of spoilt children with bloated egos, united only to protect their own interests against the Nigerian people.
The record is clear. They bullied Jonathan into sharing the Excess Crude Account, the money vanished into their private pockets. Saraki of Kwara and Amaechi of Rivers led that heist in broad daylight. They partitioned World Bank funds among themselves through “consultants,” leaving projects unexecuted and states deeper in debt. They resisted autonomy for State Houses of Assembly, the Judiciary, and Local Governments, not because it was bad policy, but because it reduced their personal control. During COVID-19, they warehoused palliatives and funds meant for ordinary Nigerians, then blamed Abuja when hunger struck and anger boiled over.
Today, the Forum has become your political liability. Nigerians blame you for all the hardships, but it is the governors who have failed to transmit and implement federal interventions at the State level. You remove subsidy and release palliatives. The governors take control, rebrand it, and turn it into personal political capital. They shared the fertilizers among their cronies in their cabinets, their “boi-bois” in the various States of Assembly and their cronies around the government houses. You push for local government autonomy. The governors fight it and starve the councils. You defend tough reforms. The governors go silent, letting you take all the bullets alone. Politically, in their various States they become demi-gods. They pick and choose as if we are in Oja-Oba market and no longer democracy.
Mr. President, “First Things First” according to Stephen Covey. In your second term, the first task must be to dismantle the collective power of the Governors’ Forum or make it functionally irrelevant.
How do you do this?
(1) Fund LGAs directly once autonomy takes effect. Stop routing every intervention through the governors. (2) Enforce constitutional autonomy for LGAs, State judiciaries, and assemblies. Prosecute governors who divert council funds immediately they leave office. Make examples of such governors.(3) Tie federal grants to performance. Publish the infraction of every governor on a public space. Let Nigerians see who is delivering and who is stealing their future. (4) Engage each governor individually. Reward reformers and performers and isolate obstructionists and laggards. Finally, do not negotiate with the Forum on matters of constitutional compliance.
Respectfully Mr President, you can enter 2027 and spend four more years fighting a proxy war with a cartel that uses State resources to undermine you. Or you can break their collective power early and force them to govern or get out of the way.
Nigerians know who holds the levers in their States. They will hold you responsible if you fail to act.
First thing first; cut the wings of the Governors’ Forum. Let them become what the constitution intended, that is, executives of individual States, not a cabal against the Federation and the people.
History will record whether you governed Nigeria, or merely governed with the permission of 36 artful dodgers called governors.
Oloroogun Sola Ajisafe
(Fundamental Ajiology)
Sunday 24 May, 2026
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