Stop selling Tinubu’s phantom million votes in Kwara Central.

By Yaqub Olohuntoyin  

When my namesake, Dr. Yakub Oloriegbe, claimed that the Ilorin Emirate Political Advisory Council would secure one million votes for President Tinubu in 2027, the statement sounded bold and devoted. Yet the claim collapsed once it was measured against the facts.

The first flaw lies in the arithmetic. Kwara Central comprises four local government areas: Asa, Ilorin East, Ilorin South, and Ilorin West. INEC’s final list of registered voters for the 2023 general elections recorded 648,091 voters in the zone. To reach one million, the area would need to add 351,909 voters over three years, from 2023 to 2026. For comparison, the entire state of Kwara added 157,318 voters between 2019 and 2023. Expecting a single senatorial zone to double the state’s four‑year growth in a single election cycle, and to do so within a few months before the 2027 general elections, is unrealistic and appears to stem from fanciful speculation.

Even if such growth had occurred, voter turnout presents another hurdle. In 2023, Kwara Central’s turnout was about 30%, slightly below the state average of 32.7%. The highest turnout Nigeria has recorded in a presidential election since 1999 was 69.1% in 2003. Turning one million registered voters into one million votes would require every registered voter to cast a ballot and for every ballot to be valid—an outcome no LGA or state has ever achieved.

The claim also ignores where the votes actually come from. A significant number of people from Kwara South live and vote in Ilorin. While they are familiar with both zones, they tend to vote in line with their home region. Any serious assessment of Kwara Central’s voter base must consider this demographic, and it is the Kwara South candidate who can reach them without provoking the usual controversies.

In 2019 and 2023, Kwara South elected Mallam AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq as governor. The fact that Kwara South did not wait for a local candidate to win en masse explains why 2023 did not become a disaster for our party in Kwara, and why the party’s flag bearer for 2027 should come from Kwara South.

As an Ilorin‑born APC supporter, I am voicing my concerns about the “one million votes” claim to safeguard our President from being misled. This is not a matter of envy toward my brother, Dr. Oloriegbe, a retired teacher and political novice seeking public attention. His promise to deliver one million votes from a senatorial zone that gave APC poor results in 2023 is absurd. It creates a dangerous illusion that could lead to under‑investment in mobilization, deepen internal fractures in Kwara Central, and damage the party’s credibility when the results are actually counted.

The larger issue is what Kwara Central has done with its existing voters. In the 2023 presidential election, the four LGAs of Kwara Central produced only 87,989 votes, representing 33% of the 263,572 votes President Tinubu received in Kwara State. The governorship figures are even more stark: APC’s vote in Kwara Central fell from 123,063 in 2019 to 90,804 in 2023—a loss of 32,259 votes. Even as a local, I recognize that a zone that lost over 32,000 votes in a single cycle cannot serve as the foundation for a one‑million vote promise.

Confidence in politics must rest on a solid plan. The APC in Kwara does not need a sensational headline that announces a fabricated promise. It needs a strategy that acknowledges where the votes are and where they have remained consistent. Kwara South has proven its consistency, and in a state where every election feels like a fresh start, that steadiness is invaluable to our loyal supporters.

Recent data shows that Kwara Central is not a reliable vote bank but a zone in retreat. The notion that a political advisory council can “deliver” fictitious votes to the President treats voters as objects to be moved by decree. It ignores the volatility that has characterized Kwara politics since 2019, with fluctuations between Kwara Central and Kwara North, while Kwara South remains steady.

President Tinubu should not be sold a promise that cannot be fulfilled. The APC in Kwara cannot base its 2027 strategy on a number conjured from thin air, just as Kwara Central cannot produce what it does not possess. The voter register, turnout history, and 2023 results all point to a zone whose vote share is collapsing at an alarming rate.

If the goal is to win Kwara convincingly in 2027, our strategy must rely on reality rather than impressive rhetoric. That reality points squarely to Kwara South as the consistent vote bank of Kwara State.

•Yaqub Olohuntoyin, a public affairs analyst, writes from Ilorin.

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