“I Have Done the Maths, Tinubu Won’t Make Top Two in 2027” — El-Rufai

Former Kaduna State governor Nasir El-Rufai has dismissed President Bola Tinubu’s chances of winning the 2027 presidential election, insisting that the president will not make the top two.

Speaking on Channels Television’s *Sunday Politics*, El-Rufai argued that the election may not be decided in the first round but maintained that Tinubu would not qualify for a runoff. According to him, political realities and recent electoral outcomes point clearly to the president’s declining strength.

“I was governor of Kaduna State; I was one of Bola Tinubu’s biggest campaigners, but I couldn’t deliver the state to him,” El-Rufai said. “Bola Tinubu himself couldn’t win his state with his own governor in place. These things are not as theoretical as people want them to be.”

He described claims of Tinubu’s political invincibility as self-delusion, stressing that even with control of resources and state institutions, the president faces the same vulnerability that former President Goodluck Jonathan encountered in 2015. “He may think, oh, I have money, I have INEC, I have the police, I have the army. Invite ex-President Goodluck Jonathan for a chat and ask him if he didn’t have all this in 2015, and we got him out. The case now is even worse,” he said.

El-Rufai insisted he has carefully done the calculations and analysis and sees no path to victory for Tinubu. “The worst-case scenario in 2027 is that no winner will emerge in the first round. We may have to go for a runoff, and Bola Tinubu will not be on the ballot for the runoff, because he will, at best, be third in the election,” he stated.

The former governor urged those close to the president to reflect on political lessons from the past rather than rely on assumptions of Tinubu’s enduring dominance.