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The National Chairman of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), Dr Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, has described the party’s presidential candidate, Donald Duke, as the best candidate in the 2027 presidential race.
Baba-Ahmed made the statement in an interview with Arise News on Wednesday while discussing the PRP’s participation in the emerging opposition coalition ahead of the 2027 general elections.
According to him, the party is fortunate to have Duke as its presidential candidate, but he acknowledged that having a strong candidate alone would not guarantee victory at the polls.
“Candidate for candidate, we think we have the best. We’re very fortunate to have him. So, candidate for candidate, Donald Duke is better than all the candidates out there,” Baba-Ahmed said.
He, however, said the PRP was focused on building a broad coalition because electoral victory would require more than the quality of an individual candidate.
“However, we’re realistic enough to know that just the quality of your candidate doesn’t just win the election, which is the reason why the PRP is in the frontline, right at the heart of this coalition building,” he said.
Baba-Ahmed said the party did not want to preempt the coalition process by insisting that Duke must automatically emerge as the alliance’s presidential candidate because of the PRP’s assessment of him.
“We don’t want to prejudge or preempt anything by saying, ‘Because he’s the best, he has to be the candidate,’ by whatever means you come to do that,” he said.
He said the PRP instead wanted to work with parties that shared similar principles and develop a coalition capable of addressing Nigeria’s major challenges.
The PRP chairman said the coalition should be guided by consensus and constitutional principles, arguing that the next government must make a significant difference in the country’s development trajectory.
“Nigeria must, in the next four years, make a difference in the manner in which this country either develops or moves away from its fault lines, or just simply sinks into that. It really is that important,” he said.
On the Supreme Court’s recent ruling concerning provisions of the Electoral Act on party membership registers and candidate nominations, Baba-Ahmed said the judgment did not affect the PRP.
He said the party had complied with the relevant requirements and timelines for the nomination of its candidates.
“In our case, we are fine. In fact, I suspect that in most cases, parties did comply with the timelines that this particular judgment of the Supreme Court refers to,” he said.
Baba-Ahmed also expressed satisfaction with the Federal High Court’s dismissal of a legal challenge to Duke’s candidacy, saying the party believed the ruling had brought the matter to an end.
“We certainly have reasons to believe so, given the manner in which the case was so thoroughly thrown out by the judge,” he said.
He maintained that the PRP had been meticulous in ensuring that Duke’s nomination complied with the law, including the requirements relating to the party’s membership register.
“It was too important not to comply with the law. You couldn’t just simply pluck a candidate for presidency from outside that register,” Baba-Ahmed said.
“He was registered within the timeframe, in the format that was required, and INEC had him all this time. We are fine with that.”
The PRP chairman said the party’s broader objective was to provide a different approach to leadership, centred on integrity, national unity and restoring confidence among young Nigerians.
He said the party wanted a leadership capable of addressing Nigeria’s challenges and restoring the country’s dignity.
“A leadership that thinks. A leadership that has integrity. A leadership that believes it must pull this country in the opposite direction. A leadership that young people can look up to,” he said.
Baba-Ahmed added that the PRP believed Nigerians outside the party could contribute to efforts to change the country’s trajectory.
“250 million people, the biggest country in Africa, floundering. We have no business being where we are. We believe it can be done, and we believe that we have the wherewithal to do that—not just by the PRP, but there are Nigerians out there who want to come in and help. That’s what we will do,” he said.
