“I’ll Resign If Tinubu Loses Rivers and FCT in 2027” – Wike

The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has declared that he will resign from the Federal Executive Council if President Bola Tinubu fails to win the 2027 presidential election in both Rivers State and the FCT.

“If President Tinubu loses FCT, Rivers, I will resign as minister,” Wike stated in Abuja on Wednesday while meeting members of the Apo Traders Association.

Wike said he could not afford to lose the two territories that have become central to his political activities. He noted that while Rivers remains his home state, Abuja is where he currently works, making victory for Tinubu in both locations particularly important to him.

He pledged to take personal responsibility for the election outcome in Rivers and the FCT.

The declaration comes amid the minister’s increasingly public political mobilisation for Tinubu’s re-election through the “Rainbow Coalition.” According to him, the cross-party platform is focused on securing the President’s second term rather than supporting All Progressives Congress (APC) candidates in other state and federal elections.

The coalition’s activities have brought Wike into a running political battle with APC governors, particularly the Progressive Governors Forum (PGF), which has insisted that APC governors will support Tinubu as well as APC candidates at all levels in 2027. The PGF, led by Imo State Governor Hope Uzodimma, rejected Wike’s political arrangements, saying they could weaken the APC or its candidates.

Wike, however, has maintained that supporting Tinubu does not require coalition members to support APC candidates in governorship and legislative contests. He has argued that the experience of the G-5 governors in 2023 demonstrated that politicians could support a presidential candidate from another party while retaining their allegiance to their own parties in other elections.

Wike has repeatedly insisted that the Rainbow Coalition is specifically designed to mobilise votes for Tinubu across party lines and has no formal affiliation with the APC. “The coalition is a platform for other political parties that are pleased with the good works of Tinubu and are supporting his re-election. It has nothing to do with APC,” he said.

The minister’s latest declaration effectively puts Rivers and the FCT at the centre of his political mobilisation, with the two territories becoming a personal test of the strength of the coalition he is championing. Wike has previously expressed confidence that Tinubu would win the FCT, while pointing to political realignments in Rivers and other states as evidence of the coalition’s reach.

His declaration is also likely to further sharpen the political contest between him and the APC governors, who have questioned the wisdom of a cross-party structure operating alongside the ruling party’s official campaign machinery.

Zamfara State Governor Dauda Lawal recently told Wike that he could not simultaneously support the APC and other political parties, insisting that political actors must make their allegiances clear. Wike, however, has maintained that he is not answerable to APC governors and that his political objective is to ensure Tinubu’s re-election.

Among the states where candidates of the Wike-backed Rainbow Coalition are posing challenges to APC structures are Kwara, Gombe, Imo, Jigawa, Ogun, Ebonyi, Enugu, Anambra, and a few others.