I‘ve never dreamt, imagined or thought of the day Nigerian politicians – in desperation for fresh or renewal of elective mandates – would not only go after their political opponents and their children, but also encourage their own children to toe the same line.
This is what stares Nigerians in the face – ahead of the make-or-mar 2027 General Election – as former Vice President and ex-presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, breaks the boundaries and off-limits in politics, and viciously attacks the family members of President Bola Tinubu.
In a move reminiscent of the biblical injunction: “Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation” (Exodus 34:7 and Deutronomy 5:9), Atiku’s breached the unwritten code of shielding politicians’ children from the extreme vagaries of politics, and gone after Tinubu’s family members, particularly Seyi Tinubu.
At stake is Seyi’s alleged interference in the leadership dispute in the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), by disrupting the induction of a factional NANS leader, Comrade Atiku Isah, who Seyi reportedly offered N100m to back the re-election of his father in 2027, failing which he engineered Isah’s kidnap and torture.
At a press briefing on April 30 in Abuja, Isah, among other allegations, claimed that the bribe attempt took place in Lagos, and after he rejected the offer, he’s “assaulted, stripped, and abducted by thugs” on April 15. “I could not endorse a president who had failed to deliver on his campaign promises,” Isah told the press.
Seyi flatly denied the allegations, and yet, Atiku jumped into the fray, and issued a blistering rebuke to Seyi, his siblings and the entire Tinubu family. Without restraints, Atiku removed the gloves, pulled no punches, and delivered heavy body blows to the Tinubus.
In a statement, “Tinubu Must Call His Family To Order: Nigeria Is Not A Private Estate,” issued by his media adviser, Paul Ibe, on May 2, Atiku urged Tinubu to restrain his family members, particularly Seyi.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu must urgently rein in his family members, particularly his son, Seyi Tinubu, who appears determined to purchase political loyalty for his father by any means necessary, including coercion, violence, and intimidation,” Atiku warned in the statement reported by Vanguard on May 2.
“Had this incident ended fatally, it would have been recorded among the growing list of atrocities committed by criminal elements in the country. That it is allegedly tied to the President’s own son makes it even more horrifying. What’s worse is the emerging suggestion that even top security officials are not beyond Seyi Tinubu’s overreaching influence – an unacceptable compromise of state institutions,” Atiku said.
Calling for an independent investigation into Isah’s allegations he described as “deeply alarming and strike at the core of democratic norms and civil liberty,” Atiku said such accusations against a member of the First Family were both “disturbing and dangerous.”
Atiku warned against any effort to “subjugate” civil society organisations, such as NANS, through “threats, bribes, or brute force,” saying, “Nigeria is a democratic republic, not a monarchy handed down to one family.”
Is Atiku politically aligned with Comrade Isah? No, the statement dismissed. Noting that Atiku’s past meeting with Isah was focused solely on education reform and student welfare, the statement insinuated a possible harm to Isah by the Tinubu family and/or his administration.
“Attempts to drag former Vice President Atiku Abubakar into this scandal by alleging a political alliance with Comrade Isah are baseless, malicious, and desperate. Comrade Isah’s advocacy and public stance must be evaluated based on fact, not fiction,” the statement said.
“We issue a clear warning: nothing must happen to this young man. Any harm to him will not go unnoticed or unchallenged. Nigerians deserve truth, accountability, and a leadership that respects the rule of law – not a regime that weaponises power to silence dissent.”
Questions: Did Atiku have all the facts, and the appropriate intel before he immersed himself in the Isah allegations, and came to the conclusion that Seyi was guilty as charged, without giving him the benefit of the doubt even when he’d vehemently denied the allegations?
Did Atiku know more than meets the eye in the viral allegations against Seyi? Is Atiku’s anti-Tinubu family attack a broader plan to get at a soft target first before the battle is taken to President Tinubu for the ultimate showdown?
Surprisingly on May 7, as reported by PUNCH on May 8, Isah recanted, and apologised to Seyi. In a post on his Facebook page tagged, “Setting the Records Straight/Public Apology to Seyi Tinubu,” Isah said his allegations against Seyi were untrue, and instigated by the other factional NANS president, Olusola Ladoja, to outsmart him in the NANS leadership tussle.
Isah’s words: “In the video, I also alleged that, for what they considered my stubbornness to reject their #100,000,000, I was on the 15th of April 2025 abducted, stripped naked, and thoroughly beaten up, and… taken to the station where an involuntary statement purportedly abdicating my position as NANS President was obtained under duress.
“It has become clear that the offer of N100,000,000, which was alleged was made to me to support President Tinubu, was clearly untrue, as Ladoja Olusola, who was desperate to get me out of my legitimate position as the duly-elected President of the National Association of Nigerian Students, fed me lies and half-truths for the sole purpose of achieving his selfish agenda of taking over the reins of the student body through the back doors.
“It was also Ladoja Olusola, who warned me that Mr Seyi Tinubu could order my killing and thereafter, instruct the Inspector General of Police, Mr Kayode Egbetokun, to bury the matter.”
Denying that Seyi didn’t lead thugs to the venue of his inauguration, but a gambit sold to him by Olusola Ladoja, Isah declared, “In fact, I later found out that Mr Seyi was nowhere near the venue.”
The inevitable and consequential questions: Now that Comrade Isah’s recalled his allegations, and apologised to Seyi for the falsehoods he peddled against him, will Atiku, also be man enough like Isah, to expeditiously and publicly apologise to the Tinubu family, particularly Seyi, for his unguarded and unwarranted attack?
Would President Tinubu have acted the way Atiku did were the shoe on the other foot? Would a taciturn Tinubu – who’s ignored his opponents’ vile campaigns against him prior to the 2023 General Election – have taken issues with Atiku and his family had Atiku’s son the subject of the debate?
Many would vouch that Tinubu won’t even directly address the matter because “he values his children and family greatly, and will not willy-nilly subject them to public ridicule via his own unguarded utterances or statements,” an anonymous respondent, who claims to know the Tinubus intimately, said at the weekend in Lagos.
Once acclaimed to be friends, what’s caused the gulf between Atiku and Tinubu? Or more aptly, what does Atiku have against Tinubu and his family members? Is it mainly politics, exacerbated by the lead-up to the 2027 General Election?
During the 2023 poll cycle, Atiku traced his parting of ways with Tinubu, politically, to the Muslim-Muslim presidential ticket in 2007. In an interview with Arise TV, aired on July 22, 2022, Atiku said: “I’m still a friend of him (Tinubu), and (but) being friends with him doesn’t mean we can’t have our political differences.
“My fundamental disagreement with Tinubu since 2007 was due to the Muslim-Muslim ticket issue. And this formed my reason to have parted ways with him politically. I remember I left PDP on the issue of zoning, and together with him (Tinubu), we formed the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN).
“I was given the ticket and Tinubu insisted that he must be my running mate. But I turned the demands down, that I will not contest the election on a Muslim-Muslim ticket base. And due to that, he switched his support to the late Umar Yar’Adua during the poll. And that was the parting point.”
Atiku’s right that his quarrel with Tinubu is over his “support” to elect PDP’s Yar’Adua in 2007. But those in the know dispute Atiku’s claim that he formed the ACN with Tinubu. Rather, Tinubu, rounding off his eight-year tenure as Governor of Lagos State (1999-2007), offered his already formed ACN platform to Atiku for his presidential run in 2007 against then-President Olusegun Obasanjo’s “anointed” Katsina State Governor Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, who took Atiku to the cleaners at the poll.
Atiku’s since kept Tinubu at arm’s length; and during the 2023 election, he took his beef with Tinubu to a new level. Witness the amount of hostility, which Atiku welded into the presidential campaign against Tinubu, including deploying huge sums of dollars into investigations, court processes in the United States, and global media attacks aimed at disqualifying Tinubu from participating in the poll, or be sacked by the courts as unduly elected and returned!
The U.S. investigations against Tinubu are alive and ongoing, pursued by an American legal researcher, Aaron Greenspan (allegedly aligned with Atiku), who pressures America’s Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) to shorten the time of reporting – from July to May 31, 2025 – on their investigations into Tinubu’s alleged narcotics deals in the 1990s, for which he reportedly forfeited $460,000 to the U.S. government.
Certainly, Atiku and his coalition of opposition politicians are preparing the grounds for the 2027 presidential run, and in their calculation, anything that adds bite to their political arsenal against Tinubu – even by dragging his son and the entire family into the fray – is fair game!
That includes the opposition politicians encouraging, enlisting and supporting their own children to join in the campaign to damage the image of President Tinubu, his family members, and government.
And that’s happening in Kaduna State via the sons of former Governor and ex-Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai; the son of Bauchi State Governor Bala Mohammed; and the son of Atiku. Together, they’ve busted the boundaries and off-limits in Nigeria’s toxic political environment!
