By Meche James, Columnist for The DailyBuzz Wire Perspective.
September 29, 2025– In the swirling dust of Nigeria’s political arena, where alliances form and fracture like desert mirages, the African Democratic Congress (ADC) has emerged as the latest beacon for the disenchanted. Billed as a “united front” against the All Progressives Congress (APC)’s iron grip, the party boasts an eclectic lineup: Peter Obi’s fiery youth brigade from the South, David Mark’s steady interim hand, and whispers of a grand coalition to unseat President Bola Tinubu in 2027.
On paper, it’s a rainbow coalition – 57% Christian, 43% Muslim, spanning Igbo, Yoruba, and Fulani lines. But peel back the gloss, and a chilling pattern emerges: a cadre of Fulani heavyweights, each with ties to the very shadows that plagued Muhammadu Buhari’s eight-year reign of insecurity, nepotism, and whispered Islamization agendas.
Let’s call it what it is: a Trojan horse. Nigerians, especially those scarred by Buhari’s legacy – the banditry that claimed over 10,000 lives, the church bombings that surged 300%, the economic nosedive that left 75.5% in poverty – cannot afford to be deceived again.
The ADC, with Aminu Tambuwal’s caliphate echoes, Nasir El-Rufai’s banditry flirtations, and Isa Pantami’s extremist ghosts, isn’t a fresh start. It’s a Fulani power play, dressed in diversity’s robes, poised to resume where Buhari left off: consolidating northern elite control under the guise of national unity.
Consider Tambuwal first, the Sokoto scion whose very name evokes the Sokoto Caliphate, that 19th-century Fulani jihadist empire founded by Usman dan Fodio, which still looms as a symbol of Hausa-Fulani hegemony in the North.
Born in Tambuwal village, Sokoto – the beating heart of the caliphate – Tambuwal isn’t just a politician; he’s a product of its conservative, theocratic soil. As governor from 2015 to 2023, he navigated the state’s religious fault lines with a deftness that critics called opportunism. Many hailed his “giant strides in the seat of the Caliphate,” but beneath the infrastructure ribbons lay a deeper allegiance: to a worldview where Sharia’s shadow stretches long.
His defection to the APC in 2018, only to circle back to opposition folds, reeks of the serial opportunism that defined Buhari’s cabal.
Now, in the ADC coalition, Tambuwal’s presence isn’t incidental; it’s a nod to northern Muslim votes. Nigerians aren’t buying it: “Tawabuwal from caliphate Sokoto is a too much risk for Nigeria to risk again after Buhari,” one political analyst warns, capturing the dread of a return to caliphate-style patronage.
Why hand the keys to Aso Rock to a man whose roots entwine with an empire built on conquest?
Then there’s El-Rufai, the Kaduna firebrand whose tenure as governor (2015–2023) was a masterclass in controversy, including alleged dalliances with the very bandits who terrorized his state.
Far from confronting insecurity, El-Rufai’s administration paid herders to “curb attacks” – a policy decried as ransom in disguise, empowering criminals rather than dismantling them.
Fast-forward to 2025: On Channels Television, he brazenly accused the Tinubu government of a “kiss-the-bandits” strategy, claiming the National Security Adviser coordinates monthly stipends and food drops to armed groups under the banner of “non-kinetic” engagement.
The ONSA fired back, calling it “falsehood” that insults fallen soldiers, but El-Rufai doubled down, insisting it’s a national policy he refuses to emulate.
If he’s so appalled, why join a coalition where his influence could steer security appointments toward more Fulani kin, echoing Buhari’s 80% northern Muslim security chiefs? Northern youth groups like the Arewa Youth Progressive Forum slammed him for “divisive comments” that betray his record: Kaduna under El-Rufai became a banditry hotspot, with Birnin Gwari and Southern Kaduna abandoned to mass killings.
His ADC role? A cynical pivot to opposition glory, leveraging Fulani networks to “reposition” power northward.
And lurking in this Fulani constellation is Isa Pantami, the former Communications Minister whose extremist past reads like a jihadist’s confessional.
As a young imam in the 2000s, Pantami openly mourned Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaeda’s Iraq chief, and defended Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, calling for death against “infidels” in fiery sermons.
A leaked U.S. cable branded him a “radical extremist cleric” expelled from a Bauchi mosque; worse, his preachings as chief imam at Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University allegedly fueled the 2004 strangling of Christian student Sunday Achi, accused of blasphemy.
Pantami renounced it all in 2021, claiming “maturity,” but the #PantamiMustGo storm exposed the rot: a man who once ideologized Boko Haram now holds sway in digital security.
His ADC whispers – tied to Atiku’s orbit – signal a soft landing for radicals, perfect for resuming Buhari’s unfinished “Islamization” script: more Muslim-heavy appointments, Sharia creep in the North, and sidelined Christian voices.
This isn’t conjecture; it’s pattern recognition. The ADC’s 2025 reboot, anchored by Atiku Abubakar (Fulani Muslim extraordinaire), pulls in these figures amid a coalition that reeks of northern recalibration. BBC reports Atiku and Obi “joining forces” in ADC, but political analyst on this discourse cuts deeper: “ADC is a team of Fulanis hungry for power… a vote for ADC is a vote to see the Fulanis council in the villa again.”
Post-Buhari, with 400 kidnapped in Kaduna just this March and 19 slain in Benue clashes in August, the wounds are raw.
Herder-farmer wars, framed as “Fulani expansionism,” displaced millions; church attacks tripled under perceived bias.
Now, ADC dangles diversity to deceive gullible Nigerians again– Obi’s Christians, Mark’s Idoma balance – but if Atiku clinches the ticket (as zoning math demands), perceptions harden into reality. It’s Buhari 2.0: security lapses excused as “caliphate will,” banditry “managed” via payoffs, and an economy captured by northern elites.
Nigerians, don’t be gaslit. The ADC’s “inclusive alternative” is a velvet glove over an iron fist. Obi’s youth might energize rallies, but without ironclad safeguards – like a southern Christian flagbearer, veto-proof mixed appointments, and public disavowals of caliphate extremism – it’s a vehicle for Fulani resurgence.
We’ve seen this script: 2015’s “change” morphed into cabal rule, polarizing along ethnic and religious lines, eroding trust until 2023’s elections bled in 20 states.
The 2025 protests, crushed with treason charges, scream fragility; hand power to this crew, and secessionist fires (IPOB, anyone?) reignite.
My plea: Scrutinize, agitate, reject the deception. Demand primaries that sideline Tambuwal’s throne, El-Rufai’s shadows, Pantami’s phantoms. Support true pan-Nigerian voices – Obi’s without the baggage, or fresh blood unbound by Fulani ambition. 2027 isn’t about opposition theater; it’s about survival.
Let the caliphate ghosts haunt history, not our future. Arise, Nigeria – but wisely.
