The Villa, the Voter, and the Vanishing Mandate
By Ameh Abraham
There is an old political maxim that power respects only power. But in Nigeria, it seems power has also learned to fear the ballot box.
In a dramatic twist that has sent shockwaves through the National Assembly, President Tinubu has reportedly rejected a desperate lobbying effort by senators seeking automatic return tickets for the 2027 elections. Instead, he has thrown their fate into the hands of the state governors. The very governors many of those senators have spent years avoiding, undermining, or treating as junior partners.
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The Senate leadership visited the Presidential Villa on April 22, expecting a quiet coronation. They left with a political rebuke. According to SaharaReporters and The Punch, Tinubu was unambiguous: “Governors are the leaders of the party in their states and must have a say on who gets the ticket.”
But beyond the palace intrigue lies a far more troubling question, one that cuts to the heart of Nigeria’s democracy. What exactly were these senators thinking? And what does their request say about their view of the Nigerian voter?
The Unspoken Contract: Did Senators Forget Who Hires Them?
Let us be clear about what an “automatic ticket” means. It means a sitting lawmaker is handed the party’s nomination without facing a primary election. It means no town hall debates. No accountability for missed constituency projects. No need to explain why the potholes in their local government remain unpaved or why the only time constituents see them is during election season. In effect, it is a declaration that incumbency is more valuable than performance.
The senators who made this plea, cloaking it in the language of “continuity and stability,” were essentially arguing that their presence in the Red Chamber is so indispensable that the democratic process of competitive primaries should be suspended in their favor.
But indispensable to whom? Not to the voters in Ogun East, where Senator Gbenga Daniel is reportedly being pushed aside by Governor Dapo Abiodun. Not to the people of Nasarawa, where Senator Aliyu Wadada has been anointed for governor, leaving his Senate seat to be contested. And certainly not to the 10 Benue lawmakers who have fallen out with Governor Hyacinth Alia and are now scrambling for political survival.
The senators’ request reveals a startling moral arrogance: the belief that a presidential blessing is a valid substitute for a popular mandate.
Undermining the Voter’s Power
Let us raise the moral question directly: When a senator begs for an automatic ticket, is he not confessing that he cannot win a free and fair primary?
In a functioning democracy, the primary election is the first test of a politician’s popularity. It is where they defend their record, articulate their vision, and most importantly, submit themselves to the will of party members. By seeking to bypass this, the senators were effectively saying that the only mandate that matters comes from the Presidential Villa, not from the polling booth.
This is not just entitlement. It is a quiet, almost casual subversion of democratic principles.
Consider the language they used. According to Daily Trust, Speaker Tajudeen Abbas argued that automatic tickets would allow lawmakers to “focus on delivering on their mandate without the distractions of internal party contests.” Let us translate that: “Please don’t make us campaign. It gets in the way of our work.”
But what work? The 9th and 10th National Assemblies have not exactly been known as chambers of legislative rigor. Between oversight that rarely bites and budgets that are passed with the speed of a presidential directive, the average senator’s “work” is often indistinguishable from the average crony’s rent-seeking.
The real distraction is not the primaries. The real distraction is accountability.
Loyalty or Strategic Calculation?
Then there is the other uncomfortable question: Were the senators simply engaging in performative loyalty to the President?
Think about it. The same senators who now claim they need “continuity” to support Tinubu’s Renewed Hope agenda are the same ones who have been silent while fuel prices soared, while the naira staggered, and while insecurity persisted in their own constituencies. Their loyalty has never been about ideology. It has been about access to contracts, to nominations, to the table.
By going to the Villa as a unified delegation, they were testing whether their collective sycophancy would earn them a reward. They were betting that Tinubu would appreciate their “support” enough to override the constitutional and internal party processes.
But Tinubu, whatever his own political flaws, understands power better than most of the Senators. He knows that a president who grants automatic tickets to 40 senators creates 40 political liabilities. He also knows that governors control state structures, and in 2027, he will need governors more than he needs any single senator.
So the President did not reject the senators out of a sudden love for democracy. He rejected them because their request was politically tone-deaf. In doing so, he handed them a mirror. And what they saw was their own moral vacancy.
The Voter’s Verdict: ‘Go and Face Us’
The irony is delicious. The senators wanted to avoid facing the voters. Instead, they now face something potentially worse: their own governors.
In Ogun State, Governor Abiodun wants Senator Daniel’s seat. In Nasarawa, Governor Sule’s structure will decide who replaces Wadada. In Benue, the Akume-Alia war has already consumed 10 federal lawmakers. These senators are now discovering that the same governors they ignored or undermined are the very people who hold their political futures.
But let us not pretend this is a victory for democracy. It is merely a shift in the locus of power, from the Presidency to the governors. The voter remains an afterthought.
The real moral of this story is simple: Nigerian politicians, whether senators or governors or presidents, have not yet learned to fear the electorate. They fear each other. They fear the structure. They fear the godfather. But they do not fear the man or woman who actually casts the ballot.
Until that changes, automatic tickets will continue to be demanded, not as a privilege, but as an assumed right. And every time a politician pleads for one, they are telling us, in plain language, that our votes do not matter.
President Tinubu has said, in effect, “Go and face the voters.” But the senators heard: Go and face the governors.
And the difference between those two instructions is the difference between a democracy and a managed democracy.
I hope that in the near future, Nigerians can remind every senator who eventually secures a ticket: you may have gotten past the governor. But you still have to face us.