2023: Obi gathers momentum, Tinubu the man to beat!
Nigerians waited with bated breath to see who the political parties will select as their presidential flag bearers for the 2023 presidential election. The wait ended a few weeks ago and the consequences of those choices are beginning to show up. As Peter obi gains momentum on social media and is driving a wave of OBI-dient followers, Atiku seems to be playing catch-up in the mean time while Tinubu is the man to beat and Kwankwaso appears to be the wildcard.
Twitter trends showing a spike in engagement for Peter Obi
Peter Obi
For Peter Obi, it can be recalled that the young people who were very vocal on social media galvanised themselves for a one-million march across the country to ask for the major opposition party, the PDP to select Obi as their flag-bearer, but 48 hours to the election Obi decided to leave the party having seen th
e hand-writing on the wall perhaps.
Many derided him for that action, but his move to the Labour party seem to be sparking a revolution. Some say his emergence as the Labour party flagbearer is majorly responsible for the uptick in PVC registrations and it is hard to argue against that. About 48 hours after his defection and emergence, the Labour Party’s twitter followers skyrocketed; it grew by over 100%, from a meagrely 1000-plus followers to over 100,000-plus followers and currently stands at about 150,000-plus followers. And if the trend is to continue, they might reach a million before the elections in February next year. This is not only happening on social media, as there are a number of defections from other political parties to the Labour party. There seems to be a growing number of volunteers who are willing to print posters, banners, face-caps, clothes and canvass across the nation in support of Obi’s candidature. Some may argue that Obi is popular in the South East only, but if evidence from Twitter or Google trend interest overtime, is anything to go by, Peter Obi is indeed gaining followers across several states from the south and growing towards the north.
He is leading in terms of Twitter engagements and second only to Tinubu in the wider google trends over the past month. Some say he does not have structure, and he argued that the over 100 million Nigerians living in poverty will be his structure. Is he the dark horse in this race? Time will tell but his opponents can only underestimate him at their own peril, because if this momentum is sustained until election day, he will be the man to beat.
Atiku
The PDP chose to throw the presidential race open to all candidates and jettisoned their long-standing zoning arrangement and this saw the emergence of former vice president Atiku Abubakar. It must be said that his emergence has not really brought about the same excitement especially among the younger people. 
Nevertheless, he is in the main opposition party, in the previous election in 2019, he had about 11 million votes (about 3million less than president Buhari) and is banking on his base to win against the party in power. Many have argued that those votes are certain to come through for him in next year’s election as PDP is dominant especially in the south-south and the south-east region. Some argue that Obi’s emergence might derail Atiku as most of the votes in the south-east will be shared. How that will affect Atiku’s chances, only time will tell. But in the interim, we can take some cues from the last election in Ekiti state to say that all may not be well with the party. They came third in the election and the Edo state governor Godwin Obaseki opined that this may be a signal for them to up their game. 
Atiku sees himself as a unifier of the country, when declaring for the presidency he said: “Under my presidency, I want to focus on five key areas: Unity of Nigeria, Security, Economy, Education and devolving more resources and powers to the federating units.” So, when the campaign season starts, that is, 150 days to the election, we can expect to see Atiku speak more about these, his popularity might soar as time goes on. He has spoken about how the current administration has failed to protect lives and that he hopes to do better. Although one of the things he has to shake off will be the recent article published by Bloomberg who argued that fighting corruption is not going to feature in the campaign trail for both Atiku and APC’s Tinubu given that they have had alleged corruption charges at one time or another.
Tinubu
Speaking of APC’s Tinubu, he is the man to beat in the next general election, he enjoys the incumbency factor given that his party has been in government for the past 7 plus years. And if we also join the structure band-wagon, he seems to have the party structure under lock and key. 
He seems to be getting endorsement from different quarters. He is very popular in the south-west perhaps has been the biggest political entity in the south-west especially given the upset that his then party ACN and the CPC pulled to unseat a sitting president during the 2015 presidential elections. When it comes to what to expect of him, we can repeat his famous phrase, emi lokan, (it is my turn). It may be his turn indeed, as he waited patiently and how he emerged during the APC primaries is a great feat even when he stood against the current vice president Prof Yemi Osinbajo. 
Let’s just say that he knows how to win, he has his machinery in place. His opponents though are concerned about his age and perhaps rightly so, given the plight of the current president who had to spend some time sick and away from governance. So, is he really fit to rule Nigeria at this stage in his life? That is the question that perhaps a lot of Nigerians will want to know. Also, some argue that he has alleged drug charges against him when he was in the US and question his source of income and how he made his money. Bloomberg in their recent article also echoed this sentiment and opined that the fight against corruption may not feature in his campaign trail, but we shall wait and see. His campaign manifesto is expected to be released in September before the commencement of campaigns as reported by his campaign organisation to the Punch.
Kwankwaso
Kwankwaso may be seen as the outsider in this race, he is loved in Kano and some parts of the North but hardly noticeable in the south, plus, he is not among the two major political parties. It must be noted that in 2015, he contested in the APC presidential primaries which was won by president Buhari. In 2019 he also contested the PDP presidential election primaries and came fourth.
He has since left for the NNPP where he emerged as the presidential flag-bearer. Only recently there was talks of a merger between his party and Peter Obi’s labour party as reported by the Punch although not much has been heard about the merger in recent days. Premium Times reported that he is set to meet with Gov Nyesom Wike of Rivers state on the 24th of June and they speculated that it may be because he is in search of a running mate. Interestingly, Peter Obi also met with Gov Wike recently. Is there something in the works there? Could Wike be the middleman to broker the merger between Kwankwaso and the Labour party? Well, in the world of politics, anything is possible, and only time will tell what comes out of their meeting with Wike. But what are Kwankwaso’s chances? At the moment, it seems quite impossible but it would be an interesting contest to say the least, if he and Peter Obi formed an alliance, they might become one to beat, as Kwankwaso is seen as a lover of education who transformed Kano while he was the governor. During his second elected term in office, he set out to rejig the political structure of Kano by: building roads, hospitals and schools and sending residents to study abroad.
