Ahead of the 2027 general election, the ability of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to manage post-primaries crises has come under serious test following the defection of some aggrieved contestants and their supporters to opposition parties and the disquiet in the camp of other defeated aspirants, ADAMU ABUH writes.

As the countdown to the 2027 general election intensifies, the leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is once again confronting a familiar and potentially destabilising challenge: managing the fallout from its primaries without triggering internal implosion.
 
For the ruling party, post-primary disputes are no longer viewed as routine democratic disagreements. Since assuming power in 2015, the APC has repeatedly learned that unresolved grievances arising from candidate selection can weaken internal cohesion, provoke costly litigation, fuel defections and, in some cases, hand electoral advantage to opposition parties without a vote being cast.
 
It is against this backdrop that the APC National Chairman, Nentawe Yilwatda, recently disclosed that the party’s National Working Committee (NWC) had activated its reconciliation and conflict-resolution structures to address grievances emanating from the party’s primaries ahead of 2027.
 
Speaking after a meeting with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Yilwatda said Presidential Conflict Resolution Committees and Party Reconciliation Committees were already working to prevent disputes from degenerating into deeper crises.
 
“We have Presidential Conflict Resolution Committees and Party Reconciliation Committees that are already working,” he said. “Politics is competitive, and when thousands of aspirants are contesting for limited positions, disagreements are inevitable.”
 
Beneath the reassurance, however, lies an unmistakable concern within the ruling party: the fear that unresolved internal battles could weaken the APC ahead of what promises to be a fiercely competitive electoral cycle.
 
The APC’s recurring vulnerability to internal disputes is rooted partly in the circumstances surrounding its formation. Unlike older parties shaped by enduring ideological traditions, the APC emerged in 2013 from a coalition of competing political tendencies united largely by the objective of removing the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) government led by former President Goodluck Jonathan from power. The merger brought together the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), factions of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and defectors from the PDP.
 
While the alliance succeeded in producing the historic 2015 victory that brought former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari to power, it also institutionalised multiple centres of influence within the party. Over the years, APC primaries have increasingly become battlegrounds involving governors, ministers, lawmakers, political godfathers and regional blocs competing for the control of party structures and electoral tickets.
 
In several states, the struggle for nominations has evolved into a contest over political survival, succession and long-term influence. The result has been a recurring cycle of internal disputes capable of threatening party unity. The APC’s experience since 2015 reveals a consistent pattern where grievances were addressed early and reconciliation remained possible; and where disputes were ignored and the consequences were politically devastating.
  
Perhaps no episode better illustrates the latter than the crisis in Zamfara State before the 2019 elections. The supremacy battle between camps loyal to former governor Abdulaziz Yari and Senator Kabiru Marafa led to parallel primaries and prolonged litigation. Despite winning the elections, the APC eventually lost all elective positions in the state after the Supreme Court ruled that the party failed to conduct valid primaries. What should have been an electoral triumph became one of the most painful self-inflicted defeats in the party’s history.
 
A similar crisis unfolded in Rivers State, where the rivalry between supporters of former Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, and Senator Magnus Abe produced court decisions that excluded the APC from participating in key elections. In Edo State, reconciliation efforts between former governor Godwin Obaseki and former National Chairman of APC, Adams Oshiomhole collapsed completely, leading to Obaseki’s defection to the PDP and eventual re-election against the APC.
 
Yet there have also been instances where swift intervention prevented fragmentation. Ahead of the 2020 governorship election in Ondo State, disagreements among supporters of late governor Rotimi Akeredolu and rival aspirants were eventually managed through negotiations and elite intervention. Likewise, after the emergence of Governor Biodun Oyebanji during the 2022 governorship primary in Ekiti State, party leaders moved swiftly to pacify dissatisfied camps and prevent defections before the election.
 
The contrast between these outcomes underscores a central lesson in Nigerian politics: unresolved grievances become more dangerous with time. Once disputes move from party structures to the courts or rival political platforms, reconciliation becomes significantly more difficult.
 
Despite renewed reconciliation efforts, warning signs are already emerging across several APC chapters. Complaints over consensus arrangements, alleged imposition of candidates and manipulation of delegate processes have triggered growing dissatisfaction among aspirants and party stakeholders.
 
One of the most politically symbolic developments is the defection of former Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Ali Pantami, from the APC to the PDP in Gombe State after disagreements surrounding the APC governorship primary. Pantami, who had withdrawn from the APC race over alleged irregularities, later emerged as the PDP governorship candidate, a development that significantly altered the political equation in the state.
 
The significance of the Pantami and his “Pantamiyya” followership episode extends beyond Gombe. It illustrates how unresolved internal grievances can quickly transform influential party figures into opposition assets.
 
In Kano State, similar cracks have also begun to appear following the primaries. A member of the Kano State House of Assembly representing Gwale Constituency, Abdulmajid Isa Umar Mai Rigar Fata, defected from the APC to the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) after failing to secure the party’s return ticket. Also joining the NDC in Kano were Kabiru Sani Auwal Obi and Mahadi Isa Umar.
 
The Kano defections, in a terrain where the Kwankwasiyya Movement led by former governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso remains deeply rooted, are politically significant because they suggest that aggrieved APC members are no longer merely threatening rebellion within the party but are increasingly willing to strengthen emerging opposition platforms capable of challenging the ruling party’s dominance in key northern states.
  
In Delta State, former Deputy President of the Senate, Ovie Omo-Agege has defected to the NDC after losing the APC ticket for Delta Central Senatorial District, saying, ‘I will not remain a sitting duck in a party where I cannot advance the interests of Delta Central, Delta State and Nigeria.”
 
Elsewhere, Senator Garba Maidoki has also been linked with grievances surrounding the primaries, while former APC National Youth Leader, Sadiq Abubakar, and House of Representatives member, Abdullahi El-Rasheed, have similarly been associated with complaints over consensus arrangements and internal exclusion. Within party circles, there are fears that more defections could follow, especially among lawmakers denied return tickets or excluded from emerging succession calculations.

Already, a governorship aspirant of the APC in Benue State, Dr. Jeffrey Kuraun, has accused the party of frustrating his attempt to challenge the outcome of the disputed governorship primary election conducted in the state on May 21, 2026.

Kuraun alleged that members of the APC Governorship Primary Election Appeal Committee became unreachable and unavailable when he attempted to formally file and present his petition against the conduct of the exercise.

He claimed that despite repeated efforts by himself, his representatives and legal team to locate or contact members of the appeal committee, they “could not be found anywhere.”

According to him, no sitting date was communicated to aggrieved aspirants, while no official channel was provided for the submission and presentation of complaints arising from the disputed primary election.

He described the development as a denial of his constitutional and democratic right to fair hearing within the party framework.

Kuraun said the development had raised serious concerns about the credibility of the party’s internal dispute resolution mechanism.

“The inability of aspirants to access the appeal committee undermines the credibility of the entire dispute resolution process and raises fundamental questions about whether the process was deliberately designed to frustrate legitimate complaints,” he stated.

The APC aspirant explained that following the alleged obstruction, he was compelled to forward his appeal through DHL courier service addressed to the National Chairman of the APC, with copies also sent to the National Legal Adviser of the party.

He, however, lamented that no formal response, invitation, hearing or reconciliation meeting had been communicated to him by the party leadership.

“This silence is both disturbing and disappointing,” he added.

Kuraun maintained that the issue transcends personal ambition and touches on the integrity of internal democracy within the ruling party.

“A political party cannot claim commitment to democracy while simultaneously denying aggrieved members access to the very mechanisms created to resolve disputes fairly,” he said.
 
Over the years, the APC has developed an elaborate conflict-management framework involving the NWC, reconciliation committees, appeal panels and interventions by influential power brokers, including governors and the Presidency.
 
This strategy became particularly evident during the 2020 internal crisis that led to the dissolution of the APC National Working Committee led by Oshiomhole and the appointment of the Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee headed by Mai Mala Buni. The intervention stabilised the party ahead of the 2023 elections and reinforced the APC’s reliance on elite accommodation as a survival mechanism.
 
But the political environment ahead of 2027 appears far more combustible. The stakes are considerably higher. Control of party structures, succession calculations, regional balancing and President Tinubu’s second-term ambition are already intensifying competition across many states.
 
At the same time, complaints about consensus arrangements and elite imposition have deepened perceptions among some party members that internal democracy is increasingly subordinate to political power calculations. Where aspirants believe outcomes were predetermined, reconciliation becomes far more difficult because grievances shift from electoral disappointment to questions of legitimacy and exclusion.
 
Still, the APC retains one enduring advantage: the resilience of Nigeria’s culture of political accommodation, where aggrieved actors often return to negotiations once future opportunities, appointments and broader strategic interests are considered.
 
Yilwatda himself expressed confidence in the party’s capacity to manage disagreements. “There is no better party for conflict resolution than our party,” he said while referencing recently concluded congresses across the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) that many predicted would fracture the APC.
 
APC founding member, Mr. Osita Okechukwu, also defended the inevitability of disputes in democratic politics, insisting that internal disagreements are part of the democratic process and can be managed through institutional mechanisms, in addition to opportunities available to aggrieved party chieftains to defect to any of the opposition parties of their choice to actualise their aspirations.
 
Yet beneath the official optimism lies a more difficult political reality. The APC’s greatest challenge ahead of 2027 elections may not come solely from opposition parties, but from the widening tension between elite control and internal inclusiveness within its own structure. The defections in Gombe, Kano and Delta states are significant not merely because prominent individuals left the party, but because they reveal how unresolved grievances can rapidly evolve into opposition opportunities across the states.
 
Significantly too, the Yilwatda-led National Working Committee is yet to hold a comprehensive strategy meeting to fully review the political implications of the outcome of the primaries and fine-tune a coordinated reconciliation framework since President Tinubu was declared winner of the APC presidential primary. That gap may prove critical.
 
So, while the APC has activated committees and informal interventions, the real challenge before the ruling party is whether it can evolve beyond ad hoc crisis management into a coherent political strategy capable of balancing ambition, inclusion and party discipline.

Ultimately, reconciliation committees and elite negotiations can only succeed where aggrieved stakeholders still believe they have a future within the party. Once that confidence collapses, internal disputes cease to be temporary disagreements and begin to shape broader political realignments.