Prince Adewole Adebayo, the Social Democratic Party (SDP) candidate in Nigeria’s 2023 presidential race, has made a bold promise: to ensure that President Bola Tinubu becomes the country’s final bad leader.
Adebayo voiced his frustration over how Nigerians repeatedly complain about their leaders but fail to break the cycle of electing the same kind of politicians.
He said Nigerians have been dissatisfied with every administration in recent history — from Goodluck Jonathan to Muhammadu Buhari, and now Tinubu — but have not taken serious steps to bring about change through the ballot.
“If you listen to politicians, they will tell you, oh, the president who is there now is the problem,” he said. “Then, it was anybody but Jonathan. And then, oh, Buhari is the problem; he’s clueless and whatever. Now, Tinubu is the problem, but I can tell you, my mission is to make sure that Tinubu is the last of the bad presidents.”
Adebayo believes that to fix Nigeria’s problems, the political structure itself must be reformed. According to him, the country needs to move away from transactional politics and toward one that invites honest, qualified citizens to participate.
“You will change the politics,” he said. “You will make Nigerians believe in the politics of their country, reasonable people who will not touch politics with a long pole. When politics is done properly, ethically, and legitimately, they will come into it.”
He noted that fixing the system is more important than focusing on individual leaders. “Once we change that system, it doesn’t matter if Tinubu can resign tomorrow,” he added. “What we need is to change the politics, and to do that, we must first change our political party, and anyone who looks at the SDP knows that we have changed the party for the better.”
He urged citizens to demand more from their leaders, saying that public pressure can force politicians to either improve or fade out. “The mandate comes from the people, and once the people raise their bar, some politicians will respond to it and some will fall by the wayside,” he said.
Rejecting the influence of money in politics, Adebayo also called on the public to support the SDP as a genuine platform for change. “I’m not going to accept,” he said about money politics.
He believes that with strong leadership and a clear direction, the SDP can help steer the country away from its troubled political past. “That is what the leadership of the SDP is working to achieve,” he said.
He further noted that the SDP’s constitution and manifesto are centered on the well-being of ordinary Nigerians. “What we want is for the party to be adopted by the Nigerian people as a platform to correct what is wrong in our politics,” he said.
