Donald Duke says willing to step down for consensus opposition candidate ahead of 2027

By Chris Steven

Donald Duke, presidential candidate of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), says President Bola Tinubu may win the 2027 presidential election if the opposition fails to unite.

Speaking on Monday during an appearance on Channels Television’s Politics Today, Duke said the opposition must begin preparing for the election and find ways to prevent a repeat of past experiences.

The former governor of Cross River, however, said Tinubu is beatable if opposition parties and politicians can put aside their differences and unite behind a common candidate.

According to him, Tinubu could emerge victorious even without securing a majority of the votes cast, if the opposition remains divided.

“Absolutely, with the chequered opposition it won’t work; Tinubu might win,” Duke said.

“The reality is that things are bound to happen on that (election) day, how to mitigate those things should be the major concern of the opposition.

“I don’t like people who cry wolf after it has happened and all that. We have done this several times over, we should anticipate it, and united we stand if we do it, if we don’t, then we will only have ourselves to blame because it has repeated itself.”

Duke also expressed his willingness to step down from the 2027 presidential race for any candidate agreed upon by the opposition to challenge Tinubu.

Asked whether he would be willing to step down for another candidate, he replied: “Absolutely. First of all, once we have commonality in objective, the next question is who is best suited for this? You need some voice of reason amongst the lot of them.”

While acknowledging that Tinubu is a formidable politician, Duke said his major concern with the president is his style of governance.

“Give it to him, he is a formidable politician. My issue with him is governance, not politics. He is weak on governance. From what we have seen over the last three years, he is very weak on governance,” Duke said.

Duke said Tinubu did not deserve another four years in office, arguing that the country was already in a state of disaster due to what he described as poor governance.

He warned that allowing Tinubu to continue in office while poverty increases year after year would take the country further in the wrong direction.

The PRP presidential candidate said he would put in place a better governance structure than Tinubu’s if elected president in 2027.