Donald Duke is not mincing words. The former Cross River State governor has drawn a sharp historical comparison between the current wave of opposition parties falling in line behind President Bola Tinubu's 2027 re-election bid and the infamous "five leprous fingers" moment from Sani Abacha's transition programme, when virtually every political party in Nigeria collapsed into support for the military dictator.
For those too young to remember, Abacha's transition to civilian rule in the late 1990s produced one of the most surreal moments in Nigerian political history: five registered parties all adopted the same man, Abacha himself, as their presidential candidate. Duke is essentially saying that what is happening now carries the same energy, and the same danger.
His warning is blunt. He believes Nigeria is heading toward disaster as political rivals abandon their positions and rally behind the sitting president. Whether those parties are doing so out of genuine conviction or calculated survival is a question Duke's analogy answers without saying it directly.
The comparison will sting precisely because it lands. Nigerians who lived through that era know exactly what Duke is invoking, and younger voters who have only read about it are now watching what he describes play out in real time. The question is whether anyone in the parties he is calling out will push back.
Originally published by Premium Times.