ADC: Steadfastness In The Face of Challenges: A Call To Duty

By SKC Ogbonnia

To my fellow ADC faithful, our resilient youth, and the steadfast defenders of Nigeria’s future, 

ARISE AND SHINE…

I write to you today not just as a member of this great family, but as a scholar who has studied the rise and fall of opposition movements across the globe. I write to you today as a compatriot who has stood in the trenches of winning and losing campaigns. And permit me to tell you this—and it is simple: The turbulence we feel right now is not the sound of a collapse; it is the sound of a new foundation being laid.

YES, I’m fully aware of the recent developments, the court cases, and the deliberate attempts by forces of reaction to overshadow the tremendous progress we have made as a rising third force in Nigeria. I know the pressures are intense. I know the noise is distracting. I know how some of you, especially the teeming youths who call our party home, feel. I definitely feel your pain, I definitively feel your anger, I fully feel your fears. 

But I am here to tell you THIS: Do not be moved!!

Look at the landscape of our nation. Today, Nigeria grapples with an inflation rate that has surged past 30%, eroding the dignity of the hardworking citizen. Today, we see a country ranked dismally on the Corruption Perceptions Index, where systemic graft continues to siphon the lifeblood of our economy. Today, we live in a country that is home to the greatest number of poor people in the world despite huge natural and human resources. Today we see our youths being forced to embrace the harsh conditions in immigration jails in foreign lands as more hopeful than the situation in their native land. The confluence is the "stability" the ruling party offers and wants to offer. 

We must be honest: every great coalition in history has faced internal tremors. From the ANC in South Africa to the democratic movements of Eastern Europe; and to even the APC when we thought the party provided hope!  

The point is that the path to unseating a behemoth is never a straight line. It is a jagged climb.

The struggle to prevent Nigeria from sliding into a stagnant one-party state was never supposed to be easy. Saving a democracy from the brink of capture is not a task for the faint-hearted. If our mission were small, our challenges would be small. But we are fighting to defeat a regime that has perfected the art of state-sponsored poverty and political exclusion. President Bola Ahmed TInubu and the ruling APC are an existential threat to Nigeria and we must persevere to defeat them.

To you, our Youth: You have found a home in the ADC because you know this is the most viable vehicle for your aspirations. Do not let the politics of the moment cloud the politics of the future, your future. You are the engine of this party. While others trade in the currency of the past and the currency of corruption, you represent the digital, intellectual, and moral capital required to reboot Nigeria.

We must now close ranks. Let us rise above the shadows of ego and selfish ambition, ensuring personal interests do not dismantle the unity required for our shared victory. We must unite with a singular, ferocious focus: to send the APC packing at both the national and state levels. Disunity is the only gift we can give the ruling party—and we must refuse to give it.

Fellow compatriots, please stay steadfast. The fight to send the ruling party parking is hard because the stakes are everything. We are not just contesting an election; we are deconstructing an evil regime that has traded our future for its comfort. Let us stand tall and sharpen our resolve. History does not remember those who sought the easy path; it remembers those who stayed when the night was darkest.

We move—TOGETHER!!

Unity is POWER!!

Dr. SKC Ogbonnia, a servant of democracy and fellow ADC faithful, writes from Ugbo, Awgu Ward 9, Enugu State