By Dr Tom Ohikere
In medicine, an abortion ends a pregnancy. In Nigerian politics, it now describes an election. The 2027 contest is being terminated before conception — not by voters, but by the architecture of power: APC, INEC, and the Presidency.
The Womb: INEC
An electoral commission is supposed to be the womb of democracy. Neutral, protected, and trusted to nurture every vote to full term. Since February 2023, that womb has looked hostile. BVAS failures in key states. IReV glitches at critical hours. Result sheets that arrived at collation centers with no origin. By the time the Supreme Court ruled in October 2023, the baby was already declared dead and the parents told to “go to court.”
2024 off-cycle elections in Kogi, Imo, and Bayelsa repeated the pattern: pre-written results, voter suppression, and security agents who watched. The 2025 LGA elections in several APC states returned 100% victories for the ruling party. When every contest ends 20-0, it is not sport. It is script.
The Surgeon: APC
A ruling party is meant to campaign. This one cauterizes. Opposition figures face asset seizures, court charges, or sudden defections after EFCC invitations. State assemblies impeach governors who won’t cross over. Federal appointments skip states that voted “wrong.” The message to 2027 aspirants is clinical: join us or your pregnancy won’t be viable.
Party primaries have become coronations. Delegate lists appear 24 hours before congresses. Consensus candidates emerge before anyone contests. The APC is not preparing for a poll. It is preparing a process where the result arrives before the ballot.
The Beneficiary: Tinubu
Every reform since May 29, 2023 landed like surgery without anesthesia. “Subsidy is gone” without buses. Naira floated without export buffers. ₦70,000 minimum wage while food inflation hit 40.87%. Power at 4,100MW for 223 million people. 4,416 kidnapped in 2023 alone, per SBM Intelligence. These are not policies. They are pre-existing conditions.
Yet the signposts for 2027 are not billboards of performance. They are appointments of loyalists to INEC RECs, nominations of party men to the judiciary, and early endorsement rallies funded by state coffers. You do not campaign for a child you already named.
The Diagnosis
Nigeria runs 209.5 TCF of gas, 9th globally. 223 million citizens. ₦70,000 minimum wage. ₦1,300 fuel. When hardship is universal and elections are predictable, voters stop asking “who will win” and start asking “why bother.” That is democratic miscarriage.
An abortion before pregnancy means the system decides which ideas can be conceived, which candidates can be born, and which votes can survive. 2027 is not two years away. It is already in the theatre.
When the player, and the trophy belong to one house, the match is fixed before kickoff.
– Dr Tom Ohikere is a public affairs analyst and former Commissioner of Information, Kogi State.
