APC’s internal fault fight scares me more than Atiku and Obi Shettima’s Stark Warning Ahead of 2027

Vice President Kashim Shettima’s candid admission that he fears the All Progressives Congress’s internal contradictions more than he fears Atiku Abubakar or a “diminished” Peter Obi cuts through the usual campaign bravado. Speaking in Abuja while unveiling the Arewa for Asiwaju campaign headquarters, Shettima framed unity as the real existential challenge for the ruling party. The statement is both a confession and a strategic signal.

In Nigerian politics, ruling parties often implode more from within than from external pressure. Shettima’s warning that northern leaders should not champion the presidential ticket while undermining their own governors is a pointed reminder of how fragile elite consensus can be. Gubernatorial elections and National Assembly races are not secondary contests; they form the local machinery that delivers votes. Undermining that machinery while waving the presidential flag is political self-sabotage. His call to “rally round our governors” and the National Assembly is an attempt to lock in the party’s existing structure before cracks widen.

The emphasis on northern solidarity is equally revealing. Shettima declared that “the North has spoken” from Adamawa to Zamfara, citing 18 of 19 northern states under APC control and the defection of most NNPP lawmakers from Kano. The launch of Arewa for Asiwaju is designed to project that northern backing as settled and organised. Yet the very need for such a coalition suggests residual anxiety about regional cohesion and the need to mobilise visibly. Claiming the North has “nothing to fear” from a Tinubu second term is an attempt to reassure a region that has historically extracted concrete concessions in exchange for political support.

On the economic front, Shettima’s defence of the administration’s record is standard campaign rhetoric but rests on selective framing. He highlighted the jump in foreign reserves from $3.9 billion to nearly $59 billion and the inheritance of a large Ways and Means burden, presenting Tinubu as the leader who pulled Nigeria back from the brink.

These figures matter, but they do not erase the daily reality he himself acknowledged: many households still struggle to make ends meet. The admission that “we lose our hearing when applause becomes our only source of information” is one of the more honest lines in the speech. It concedes that elite self-congratulation can disconnect leaders from ordinary hardship.

Structurally, Shettima pointed to the APC’s numerical advantage—over 361,000 officials against 176,845 polling units—as evidence of organisational strength. Matching every polling unit “two to two” sounds formidable on paper. In practice, the quality of that structure, the loyalty of those officials, and the absence of internal sabotage will determine whether the numbers translate into votes.

Shettima’s instruction to “defeat Baba Atiku… respectfully” and his relatively dismissive treatment of Peter Obi suggest the ruling party currently views the opposition as manageable provided it keeps its own house in order. That calculation may prove correct, or it may underestimate the cumulative effect of economic discontent and the capacity of opposition forces to capitalise on any visible APC disarray.

The deeper message from the Vice President is clear: the greatest threat to the Tinubu-Shettima ticket is not the PDP or Labour Party, but the possibility that the APC fails to act as a coherent political family. In a polity where elite defections, local sabotage, and regional horse-trading routinely reshape outcomes, that fear is neither paranoid nor misplaced. Whether the party heeds the warning will shape the 2027 contest far more than any single opposition rally.