Nigeria’s simmering political rivalry between former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and President Bola Tinubu escalated sharply this week, with Atiku issuing a direct and unusually blunt challenge to the federal government over long-standing allegations tied to a $16 billion power sector expenditure. Speaking through his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, Atiku dared the Tinubu administration to formally investigate and prosecute him if it genuinely possesses evidence connecting him to wrongdoing in the power projects, dismissing what he described as a coordinated attempt to distract Nigerians from more pressing economic questions.
The statement, released on Wednesday, positioned Atiku’s response as both a defense and a counterattack. Rather than simply denying wrongdoing, the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress framed the renewed allegations as a deliberate diversion tactic timed to shift public attention away from a question he has been pressing aggressively in recent weeks, where exactly has the money gone since Nigeria removed its petrol subsidy in 2023. That framing matters, because it ties this specific power sector dispute directly into the broader and more consequential fight currently playing out between Atiku and the presidency over subsidy policy, government revenue, and the rising cost of living facing ordinary Nigerians.
Atiku’s language in the statement left little room for ambiguity about how he wanted the challenge to be read. “It is still not too late. Investigate me. Invite me. Produce the evidence. Prosecute me if you have a case. But propaganda cannot substitute for evidence,” the statement read, according to Atiku’s camp. That line has since been picked up widely across Nigerian media, largely because it represents a rare instance of a major political figure explicitly inviting formal investigation rather than simply issuing a denial and moving on. Whether that invitation gets taken up by federal authorities remains to be seen, and skeptics on both sides of Nigeria’s political divide will likely read the challenge differently depending on their existing loyalties.
Central to Atiku’s defense is a specific claim about due process, or the alleged lack of it, in how these power sector allegations have been handled historically. According to the statement, the National Assembly previously investigated the power projects tied to the $16 billion figure, but Atiku says he was never formally invited to respond to any allegation arising from that investigation. He acknowledged that he chaired the National Council on Privatisation during his time as vice president, a role with genuine oversight responsibilities, but maintained that this position did not extend to overseeing the implementation of the specific power projects now being scrutinized. That distinction, between chairing a policy-setting council and directly managing project execution, is likely to become a key point of contention if this dispute escalates into a more formal political or legal confrontation.
The timing of Atiku’s counterattack is not incidental. His statement arrives amid an intensifying standoff with the Tinubu administration over the economic consequences of the 2023 petrol subsidy removal, an issue that has become the defining flashpoint of the early 2027 campaign season. Atiku has increasingly used the subsidy debate as his central line of attack against Tinubu, arguing that Nigerians endured significant hardship on the promise that removing the subsidy would free up government resources for development, only to see petrol, transportation and food prices climb sharply while ordinary purchasing power eroded. In his statement, Atiku posed the question directly, asking where the government’s increased revenue has actually gone, while simultaneously pointing to what he characterizes as continued tax incentives, waivers and concessions extended to wealthier interests in the petroleum sector.
That argument follows a consistent pattern in Atiku’s recent messaging, one built around highlighting what he frames as a fundamental inconsistency in the government’s approach to economic relief. He has argued that it is contradictory for the administration to withdraw subsidy support from lower income Nigerians while simultaneously defending tax credits and fiscal incentives extended to larger investors and corporations in the same sector. Framing his power sector rebuttal within that larger critique allows Atiku to position the fresh allegations against him not as an isolated legal matter but as part of what he describes as a broader pattern of selective accountability, one he argues is being wielded strategically against political opponents while more powerful interests escape similar scrutiny.
The Tinubu administration and its allies have not publicly responded in detail to Atiku’s specific challenge as of this reporting, though the broader political exchange between the two camps has grown increasingly heated over recent weeks. Presidential aides and party officials have previously accused Atiku of political opportunism, particularly regarding his reversal on the subsidy question, given that he had supported subsidy removal ahead of the 2023 election before pivoting toward advocating a return to some form of the policy in his 2027 campaign. That earlier dispute over subsidy consistency now sits alongside this fresh confrontation over the power sector allegations, suggesting the two camps are likely to continue trading accusations across multiple economic fronts as the campaign season progresses.
For ordinary Nigerians watching this exchange unfold, the practical stakes may feel somewhat removed from daily concerns like fuel prices and food costs, yet the underlying dynamic speaks directly to a broader question of institutional accountability. If Atiku’s claim holds up, that he was investigated by the National Assembly on power sector spending without ever being formally invited to answer specific allegations, it raises legitimate questions about how thoroughly Nigeria’s legislative oversight mechanisms actually function when politically significant figures are involved. Conversely, if the federal government does possess credible evidence linking Atiku to wrongdoing in the power projects, his public challenge effectively puts pressure on authorities to either act decisively or risk appearing to have used unsubstantiated allegations purely for political effect.
What happens next will likely depend less on the legal merits of the underlying $16 billion power sector allegations, which have circulated in various forms for years without resulting in prosecution, and more on how each side chooses to leverage this exchange politically heading toward the 2027 election. Atiku has effectively raised the stakes by inviting formal scrutiny rather than avoiding it, a calculated bet that either forces his accusers to substantiate their claims or exposes the allegations as recycled political ammunition with no real evidentiary basis behind them.
