Nigerians await people’s party, by Aare Amerijoye

There are moments in history when the air itself carries the scent of rebellion, when the streets whisper the gospel of discontent, and when the battered souls of the masses rise above the silence of suffering to scream for salvation. This is one of those moments.

In the blistering furnace of economic hardship, amidst the crumbling columns of trust, and beneath the weight of unfulfilled promises, the Nigerian people now anxiously await the emergence of a coalition of redemption, a People’s Party, not just in name but in essence. A political sanctuary led by Atiku Abubakar, fortified by the spirit of national inclusion, and flanked by allies from across political spectrums, forged in the crucible of a common enemy: failure.

The people do not seek miracles. They seek meaning.

From the turbulent trenches of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, a man once mocked for his idealism, has become a symbol of stubborn hope. From the ideological ruins of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Nasir El-Rufai re-emerges, bruised by conscience and perhaps stirred by the weight of truth. Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, once a determinant factor the defunct ACN, now stands disillusioned, his silence more damning than any spoken word. Rotimi Amaechi, the voice of the estranged nPDP, whose internal scars narrate the betrayal of trust, now ponders redemption. These are not defectors, they are defected dreams returning home.

They are co-authors of a new political chapter, bound not by past loyalties, but by future obligations.

What unites them now is not party logo nor power thirst, but a common disdain for the dystopia that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his APC regime have inflicted upon this nation. A regime of paradox, where the rich are bankrupt in empathy and the poor are taxed in suffering; where oil flows beneath our feet, yet hunger flows through our veins.

Philosopher Georges Duhamel once said, “The future is made of the same stuff as the present.” The tragedy of APC is that it became conservative even before delivering its revolution. Instead of disrupting the rot, it reinforced it with cemented impunity.

We live now in a nation where hope is rationed like petrol, and truth is subsidized by propaganda. In the theatre of absurdity that defines this administration, hardship has been renamed reform, and suffering is dressed as sacrifice. The people are told to tighten their belts while the government expands its convoy. Is this governance or guile?

But the people are not fools. They are not broken,they are boiling.

Across the cities and villages, on the lips of mechanics and market women, in the cries of students and the sighs of pensioners, there is one chant echoing from the walls of despair: “We want a new deal!” And not the recycled incompetence dressed in agbada. They want a realignment of values, a restitution of justice, a resurrection of dignity. They want Atiku, not just the man, but the metaphor, for balance, experience, and preparedness.

The time has come to construct a rainbow coalition of the disenchanted, to transform fractured grievances into a unified thunderclap of change. The enemies of the people are not the people from the other party, but the party that has become an enemy of the people.

APC, in power, has become the nation’s metaphorical plague, a party of promise that delivers pestilence. As the weight of Tinubu’s economic experimentation suffocates the common man, and his elitist cabal drinks wine on a sinking ship, the masses groan with growing urgency.

As Edmund Wilson once observed, “No two persons ever read the same book.” Nigeria’s tragedy is that the leaders and the people were never reading from the same script.

The 2027 elections must not be a contest, it must be an exorcism. The Tinubu-led APC government must be expelled from the consciousness of power, not just with votes but with vision. The people’s party must not just win, it must redeem.

And to do so, it must carry the Obi’s clarity, the El-Rufai’s candor, the Aregbesola’s reformist fire, the Amaechi’s defiance, and above all, Atiku’s institutional wisdom. The party must become a mirror of Nigeria’s suffering and a map to its salvation.

The suffering masses are not just waiting, they are watching.

They are watching to see who will have the courage to rise above ego, to choose nation over ambition, unity over faction, reality over fantasy. They are watching for a party not born of opportunism, but of organized outrage; not driven by entitlement, but by empathy.

Let this not be another alliance of convenience.

Let it be a coalition of conscience.

As Jean Genet once wrote, “Power may be at the end of a gun, but sometimes it’s also at the end of the shadow or the image of a gun.” And yes, uniting the fragmented pieces of Nigeria’s true patriots seems impossible,but so does enduring the next three years under the economic chokehold of Tinubu’s APC.

Let the people’s party rise.

Let Atiku lead it.

Let Obi lend it his voice, let El-Rufai add his fire, let Aregbesola bring his candor, let Amaechi echo the grievances of the betrayed, and let the Nigerian people anoint it with their sacred ballot.

The time is ripe. The people are ready. The system is rotten.

Let us not reform it. Because a hungry nation cannot survive on promises, and a broken people deserve more than recycled pain.

Let us replace it.

Aare Amerijoye DOT.B.
Director General
The Narrative Force.