Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has declared that the 2027 general elections will not bring an end to Nigeria’s corporate existence despite the challenges confronting the nation’s democracy.
He noted that the recent governorship election in Osun State showed that the country’s democracy was maturing, adding that President Bola Tinubu, as a lifelong democrat, remains committed to leaving behind a stronger democracy than he inherited.
The governor spoke on Thursday while delivering the Freedom Online 7th Yearly Lecture at the Sheraton Lagos Hotel, Ikeja.
The lecture with the theme, “2027 Elections, Economy, Security and Nigeria’s Future,” was chaired by a former Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, while a former Ogun State Governor and Senator representing Ogun East, Otunba Gbenga Daniel, was the Special Guest of Honour.
The event also attracted eminent personalities, including the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate in Ogun State, Hon. Oladipupo Adebutu, Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland, Iba Gani Adams; President of Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE), Eze Anaba, former NGE President, Funke Egbemode, and former presidential spokesman, Femi Adesina, among others.
Sanwo-Olu, who maintained that Nigeria’s elections have significantly improved, praised the democratic credentials of President Tinubu under whose watch a ruling party can lose election without triggering any crisis.
He said, “On the 15th of August, the people of Osun State elected a governor. The candidate of my party, the President’s party, lost. The incumbent, Governor Ademola Adeleke, of a different party, won by more than sixty thousand votes. The President did not sulk and he did not equivocate.
“He picked up the telephone the following day, congratulated the winner, urged him to unite the state, and thanked INEC and the security agencies for a peaceful and transparent election.
“Governor Adeleke has since publicly thanked the President for ensuring a level playing field. Think about what that means. There was a time in this country when ‘federal might’ was a phrase that a ruling party used without irony.”
The governor noted that the development signalled a departure from the past when opposition parties hardly stood a chance against the ruling party.
“Our elections have improved. Anyone who covered the elections of the 2000s, as many in this hall did, knows how far we have come, and much of that distance was travelled on this party’s watch: the Electoral Act of 2022 and now the Electoral Act of 2026, and the technology that verifies voters and transmits results,” Sanwo-Olu said.
He further said, “There is a future beyond 2027, and it is a bright one. The President has set the destination: a one-trillion-dollar economy by 2030. I know there are people who scoff at that number. People also scoffed at reserves of fifty billion dollars, and at a billion dollars a month in remittances, and at a stock market worth more than 150 trillion Naira. Set the target, do the work, and let the scoffers keep the score.
“We have moved past the era when every election felt like the one that might end the Republic. When the 2027 elections are done, 2031 will come, and then 2035, and 2039. That confidence, which our parents never had, is itself an achievement of this democracy and we should say so.”
Sanwo-Olu, who expressed confidence that President Tinubu would win the 2027 presidential election based on his performance in office, berated opposition politicians seeking to make the return of fuel subsidy a major campaign issue ahead of the poll.
Apparently reacting to the pledge by former Vice President and presidential candidate of African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, to restore fuel subsidy, the governor contended that Nigerians deserve better slogans.
Sanwo-Olu explained, “The subsidy was not removed because anybody enjoyed removing it. It was removed because it had become a hole in the national purse through which the money for roads, schools and hospitals was draining away, and because much of that money was never reaching the ordinary motorist it was supposed to help.
“In the 2023 election, every major candidate promised to remove it. Only one of them was in a position to do it, and he did it on the first day in office. I will not stand here and tell you that it has been painless. It has not. Lagosians have felt it at the pump, at the market, and in the price of a bag of rice, and any governor who tells you otherwise has not been listening to his own people.
“But the measure of a reform is not whether it hurts. It is whether it heals. And the evidence that this one is healing is now arriving, quarter by quarter.”
The governor criticised how opposition politicians had reached for the fuel subsidy as their instrument of choice, noting however that the country would see more of such promises that no treasury on earth could honour.
Sanwo-Olu assured that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) will deepen ongoing reforms in the country and ensure that “the benefits reach quickly and visibly the people who bore the cost.”
The governor also used the occasion to appeal to journalists to help Nigeria sustain its democracy by checking facts and calling out disinformation capable of destroying the country.
“I will not disguise my hope for the outcome (of the election). I expect my party to win, and I expect a second term for President Tinubu to consolidate the Renewed Hope agenda, because an unfinished reform is the most expensive kind.”
“But whatever the outcome, I expect the election to be peaceful, I expect the loser to concede, and I expect Nigeria to add one more milestone to its record,” he submitted.
