By Omonu Nelson
A political earthquake is shaking the road to 2027: a powerful coalition of federal agency heads has officially formed to spearhead President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s re-election campaign. This unprecedented alignment of institutional leaders represents the most strategic and formidable innovation yet ahead of the next general elections.
Under the aegis of the Forum of CEOs of Federal Parastatals, FORCEPA, these institutional heavyweights have resolved that the campaign cannot be left to the governing All Progressives Congress, APC, alone. Instead, those who execute the government’s policies must actively participate in renewing its mandate — a profound shift in political thinking.
For years, bureaucrats abandoned the battlefield, cowardly hiding in the shadows. The architects of vital public programmes retreated behind ivory towers of silence, leaving their critical achievements defenceless against political crossfire and partisan sabotage. By refusing to stand and fight for their own records, these administrators surrendered the narrative to opportunists in the opposition, who would rather weaponise their hard-won results than protect the people they serve.
By engaging the APC National Chairman, Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda, and the National Working Committee, the Forum — led by its Chairman, Dr. Kazeem Kolawole Raji, Director-General of the National Board for Technology Incubation — aims to close the dangerous gap between performance and perception. Its stance is simple and compelling: where the government has delivered, those achievements must be shared. After all, who is better equipped to communicate results than the people who produced them?
The strategic advantages of this coalition are monumental. While the 2023 campaign centred on promises of what President Tinubu would do, the 2027 narrative will shift entirely to accountability — what he has achieved. Winning that argument demands hard data, institutional memory and deep grassroots mobilisation. These chief executives command exactly those assets, making them indispensable to anchoring the next campaign in undeniable evidence.
They provide a complementary technical structure designed to extend the reach of the Presidential Campaign Council, not to compete with it. As professionals, public-sector leaders and political stakeholders, they offer deep expertise in election planning, grassroots mobilisation and strategic messaging. By leveraging nationwide networks through their parastatals, they will drive government messaging into communities that the central campaign machinery often misses.
Also Read: Tinubu leads APC campaign rally in 12 states
In doing so, they affirm the boldness of President Tinubu’s reforms, showing that key insiders who have weighed the costs and benefits of difficult decisions remain confident enough to campaign publicly on that record. That courage is now being validated beyond Nigeria.
Five influential international institutions and rating agencies — the International Monetary FundFIR, the World Bank, the African Development Bank, Fitch and S&P — have acknowledged Coalition of Parastatalsprogress in Nigeria’s reform programme under President Tinubu. Their assessments point to improving macroeconomic stability, stronger external balances, better revenue mobilisation and renewed confidence in economic policy.
This external validation gives the Forum a credible foundation on which to build its campaign messaging. However, as the chief executives themselves understand, the next test is to translate these macro gains into lower living costs, more jobs, higher purchasing power and better living standards for ordinary Nigerians. That is precisely why their grassroots presence matters.
The calibre of the Forum’s leadership virtually guarantees its success, anchored by its Chairman, Dr. Raji — a distinguished telecommunications authority with more than 25 years of proven success in leadership, project management and technological innovation.
Dr. Raji, an Oyo State-born engineer affectionately known as “Raji KK”, is a distinguished leader whose academic and leadership foundation was built at the prestigious University of Ibadan. During his time there, he served as Hall Chairman of Nnamdi Azikiwe Hall — widely recognised as the most vibrant, politically active and influential student residence in any African university.
He possesses an extraordinary academic portfolio that reflects a lifelong commitment to excellence; his qualifications span multiple disciplines, including a PhD. Combining deep technical engineering expertise, executive business acumen and a proven track record of grassroots leadership, Dr. Raji stands out as a dynamic force in both academia and corporate management. During the 2023 general elections, he drove key grassroots initiatives as Director of National Youth Mobilisation (South West) for the Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Campaign Council.
Another member of the Forum who embodies the suitability of this arrangement is Otunba Biodun Ajiboye, Chairman of the Forum’s Media and Publicity Committee and Executive Secretary of the National Institute for Cultural Orientation, NICO. Ajiboye’s entry into public service is no accident: he brings the formidable expertise of a seasoned media personality and a legendary advertising leader with more than three decades of pioneering experience.
That blend of professional expertise, political loyalty and oratorical power makes him perfectly cast for his current role. He understands that an election is won not just by mobilisation, but by messaging — and that for an incumbent, that messaging must be rooted in performance.
As CEO of NICO, he directly executes the Renewed Hope Agenda in the cultural sector while remaining one of the ruling party’s most consummate communicators. Thus, when he argues that the communication apparatus cannot be left to the PCC alone — advocating that the Forum act as a technical monitoring body to identify gaps and reinforce narratives — he speaks from both experience and authority.
Ultimately, the contribution of this coalition to the success of President Tinubu’s second-term bid in 2027 could be decisive. It provides what every incumbent needs but rarely organises early enough: a credible, coordinated and decentralised army of validators who can speak with authority about what the government has achieved. It transforms the campaign from a purely party affair into a national project driven by those who know the work at first hand.
To dismantle the opposition’s relentless campaign of deceit and manufactured narratives, this coalition stands as an unstoppable frontline of undeniable facts, raw institutional power and boots-on-the-ground dominance.
By deploying its members to explain, defend and mobilise around the administration’s record — from internationally acknowledged macroeconomic reforms to everyday community impact — it ensures that the President’s long-term economic ambitions are not just understood in Washington, London and Abidjan, but felt in markets, farms and homes across Nigeria.
This is how elections are won in mature democracies: not by slogans alone, but by aligning the implementers with the campaigners. With Otunba Ajiboye providing the strategic communication leadership, the Forum has positioned itself as a critical pillar for victory in 2027.
*Omonu writes from Abuja.
