Pro-Tinubu Group Plans Ohanaeze Meeting Over Obi’s Stepping Down For Tinubu

A Pro-Tinubu support group, the Renewed Hope for Greater Nigeria (RHGN), has said they are finalising plans to meet the leadership of the Ohanaeze Ndigbo Worldwide to appeal to the Presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr. Peter Obi, to withdraw from the 2027 general election, and join the All Progressives Congress (APC) and support President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s re-election bid.

Deputy National Leader (Southeast) of the Renewed Hope for Greater Nigeria, Mazi Franklin Ngoforo made the disclosure while addressing newsmen in Owerri at the weekend.

He said the engagement with Obi and the wider Igbo political establishment would begin in the coming days.

Ngoforo said the central focus of their group was how to secure victory for President Tinubu in all polling units across the five Southeast states.

He appealed to Obi to consider that withdrawing from the 2027 race would not necessarily represent the end of his presidential journey, arguing that he remains young enough to pursue the ambition at another time and under circumstances potentially more favourable to the Southeast.

According to the RHGN leader, what the organisation is proposing is ultimately a long-term political strategy; secure Tinubu’s support from the Southeast now; strengthen relations with the Southwest and North, and position the Southeast for a more compelling claim when the presidency next becomes available to the South.

Ngoforo said plans are being perfected on how RHGN would approach the leadership of Ohanaeze Ndigbo under Senator John Azuta Mbata, alongside elder statesmen including Chief Emeka Anyaoku and Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe, and other influential Igbo leaders, urging them to lead a delegation to Obi to step down for Tinubu.

According to him, the proposed intervention is not intended to diminish Obi or question his political stature, but to persuade him to place the long-term strategic interests of Ndigbo above the immediate pursuit of a presidential ticket, saying the objective would be to get the NDC presidential candidate to examine the 2027 contest beyond the prism of personal ambition and realize that a broader political bargain could put the Southeast in a stronger position to secure the presidency in the nearest future.

Ngoforo said the plan is bolstered by the current internal crisis within the NDC, particularly disputes arising from the processes through which candidates were selected across constituencies in the Southeast.

He argued that the controversy had “generated deep discontent within the party and totally weakened the political structure that Obi would ordinarily depend upon for a presidential campaign. In my assessment, a presidential ambition is only as strong as the political machinery behind it, and the fragmentation of what once appeared to be a strong support structure raises serious questions about the viability of another presidential bid under the present circumstances. RHGN believes Obi should therefore consider whether continuing the contest from a weakened opposition platform represents the best use of his considerable political capital”, he said.

Further, he said the second consideration was the calculation in Northern Nigeria, saying consultations undertaken by RHGN Southeast with northern political leaders had reinforced the organisation’s belief that Obi’s reported commitment to serving only one term could not persuade the North to support his presidential ambition.

In other words, he said “the politics of presidential succession cannot be reduced to a promise of a four-year tenure. Northern political interests, like those of every other geopolitical zone, are likely to be driven by realistic calculations about power, succession and political security. RHGN’s argument is that Igbo political strategy must recognise this fact instead of assuming that a one-term pledge would automatically unlock northern support for an Obi presidency”.

According to him, the most important issue is what the southeast stands to gain by building a strategic political relationship with the Southwest. Ngoforo said the South-South had already produced a President in Goodluck Jonathan, while the Southwest produced Olusegun Obasanjo and is currently represented at the presidency by Tinubu. He added the argument that with Tinubu constitutionally limited to the present electoral cycle if re-elected, the Southeast should consider supporting the Southwest now while building a political compact capable of yielding uncontested dividends when power next returns to the South.

The RHGN Deputy National leader said “rather than viewing 2027 solely as a contest to be won or lost, Ndigbo should view it as an opportunity to accumulate political goodwill and establish reciprocal obligations with other regions. The strategic logic is straightforward: Nigeria’s presidency cannot be secured by any geopolitical zone acting entirely alone. The Southeast may possess a compelling historical and political case for producing the next president from the region, but converting that aspiration into electoral reality requires alliances outside the region.

“I believe that supporting Tinubu’s second-term bid could create a political debt that becomes useful when the Southeast eventually makes its own claim. The objective should be to ‘be in their debt, so that they owe in reciprocity’. For RHGN, political power is not merely about immediate votes; it is also about relationships, alliances, trust and the capacity to mobilise support across regional boundaries”, Ngoforo said.

He said his position was based on important policy convergence between Obi and the Tinubu administration and cited the removal of fuel subsidy, noting that it was one of the most politically difficult economic decisions taken by the Federal Government.

The RHGN executive argued that if Obi accepts the fundamental necessity or direction of major policies being pursued by the Tinubu administration, there is no more reason in seeking to displace a government over policies with which he totally agrees, saying “RHGN therefore sees the apparent convergence not as a reason for political rivalry but as an opening for dialogue, cooperation and a possible realignment of political forces around what it considers the broader national interest”.