The Presidency has dismissed former Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s allegation that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu intends to remain in power for life, insisting the President has no plan to extend his tenure beyond 2031 if he wins a second term.
Over the weekend, El-Rufai urged ex–Vice President Atiku Abubakar to unite Nigerians against Tinubu in 2027, accusing the administration of concentrating power rather than devolving it. “If we don’t end this Tinubu administration by 2027, he will try to be our Paul Biya, to be president for life. All the signs are there; this is how Paul Biya started,” El-Rufai claimed.
Reacting in a statement on Sunday, presidential spokesperson Bayo Onanuga dismissed the remarks as “unfounded and speculative.”
According to Onanuga, El-Rufai appears to have realised that efforts by his allies in his new party to block Tinubu’s anticipated re-election in 2027 are “doomed to fail.” He noted that the President’s popularity, especially in the North, remains strong, citing the warm reception Tinubu received in Kaduna last Friday.
Onanuga argued that El-Rufai’s “life presidency” claim contradicts his own assertion that the region has abandoned Tinubu. He described any suggestion of a plan to elongate Tinubu’s tenure as “baseless and absurd,” stressing that the President “is a committed democrat who will hand over power on May 28, 2031, at the end of a second term, if re-elected.”
He further advised Kaduna State Governor Uba Sani to engage his predecessor, remarking that El-Rufai “could benefit from professional counselling to steer him away from hallucinations and political fabrications about Tinubu and 2027.”
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