There are growing uncertainties over the fate of Vice President Kashim Shettima’s place on the 2027 presidential ticket of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
The APC National Chairman, Abdullahi Ganduje, heightened the uncertainties on Sunday in Gombe, Gombe State, at a gathering of leaders of the party from the Northeast geopolitical zone.
Shettima is from Borno State, one of the six states in the zone. Other states in the zone are Yobe, Adamawa, Taraba, Bauchi and Gombe.
The event was attended by governors of the three states in the zone being controlled by the APC – Gombe, Yobe and Borno. Cabinet ministers and federal lawmakers from the six states were also at the event.
Proceedings turned chaotic when Ganduje, who led some party stakeholders to the parley, announced the endorsement of Tinubu for 2027 by the Northeast leaders but was silent on Shettima.
Ganduje’s action drew the ire of members of the various support groups at the event, who attempted to rough handle the party chairman.
According to some APC members at the event, security personnel were forced to intervene as they escorted Ganduje out of the venue of the meeting.
Witnesses said the event was brought to an abrupt end to prevent the situation from escalating.
The APC National Vice Chairman, Northeast zone, Mustapha Salihu, was the first to omit Shettima’s name on the ticket when he spoke earlier before Ganduje.
Salihu was similarly mobbed by the crowd who expected the National Chairman to correct what they initially thought was a mistake by the zonal vice chairman.
The development tends to reinforce insinuations that the President and the Vice President might be having a disagreement that could affect their joint ticket in 2027.
Investigation by THE WHISTLER revealed that the alleged disagreement between the two leaders could have stemmed from the protest that greeted the introduction of the Tax Reform Bills.
President Tinubu had, in October 2024, transmitted the four-pronged tax bills to the National Assembly for consideration and passage.
The introduction of the bills met with criticisms from many parts of the country, particularly the North.
Among the loudest protest voices against the bill, was the Borno State Governor, Babagana Zulum who is a protégé of the Vice President.
Sources close to the presidency said Tinubu viewed Governor Zulum’s open criticism of the bills an affront, considering the position of his mentor, Shettima in the government.
More galling to the President, one of the sources said, was Zulum’s position at the time, that only Lagos State stood to benefit from the tax bills if passed as proposed.
“Everybody knows that Shettima is to Governor Zulum what President Tinubu is to Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State. In the eyes of the public, some actions of the Lagos governor could be rightly or wrongly linked to the President, just as some actions of the Borno governor might be linked to Shettima, rightly or wrongly. You may draw your conclusions from that,”another source said.
The source, however, dismissed reports of any disagreement between the two leaders, saying that the fact that the vice president was not named as a potential running mate to the president in 2027 at the Gombe event, should not be construed as rejection.
“We are in 2025 and 2027 is still two years away. In a political environment like ours, every gossip is taken as fact and there is nothing anybody can do about it. Those in doubt of the existing cordial relationship between the president and the vice president should save their breath. Nothing has changed,” the source said.
