ABUJA, NIGERIA – The lingering debate surrounding the historic political realignment of 2015 has been forcefully reopened. Former Minister of Transportation and former Governor of Rivers State, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, has publicly dismissed claims that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was the sole architect behind the political ascension of former President Muhammadu Buhari.
Amaechi asserted that he, in fact, played the definitive and central operational role in securing Buhari’s victory during that watershed general election, which permanently fractured and ended the 16-year governance monopoly of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Speaking with deep candor during a live interview on Arise News’ Prime Time programme on Friday, May 22, 2026, the prominent opposition figure explained that he had deliberately chosen to maintain a strategic silence for several years while Tinubu repeatedly claimed primary credit for bringing Buhari to regional and national power.
According to Amaechi, it would have been tactically reckless and politically self-destructive to openly counter or challenge those narratives at the time, given his high-profile assignment within the federal cabinet.
Amaechi provided a rare glimpse into the intense internal pressures and administrative dynamics that governed the inner circle of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) during its first two terms in power. He revealed that confronting the political heavyweights of the party while serving at the pleasure of the commander-in-chief would have carried immediate career-ending consequences.
“When we decided to form the APC, while I was a minister, Tinubu was claiming he made Buhari president and I couldn’t respond because I was a minister under President Buhari,” Amaechi recounted with striking transparency. “That would have been suicidal because Buhari could fire you.”
Because of that rigid institutional hierarchy, the former minister explained that he could not simply step up to a microphone and publicly declare the claims to be factually wrong. He insisted, however, that the historical record remains clear regarding who absorbed the brunt of the political warfare required to uproot an incumbent federal government.
“So I couldn’t have said, ‘You are wrong.’ He didn’t make President Buhari president,” Amaechi added emphatically. “Not only was I the DG of the campaign, but everybody will bear witness that I did all the battle.”
Defending his legacy as an irreplaceable catalyst for the 2015 political shift, the former Rivers State Governor detailed his exhaustive schedule as the head of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) during that volatile era. He argued that his contributions went far beyond standard platform speeches and campaign appearances, involving high-stakes cross-regional diplomacy and structural mobilization.
Amaechi explained that he utilized his powerful position as the leader of the nation's governors to criss-cross the length and breadth of the country, fighting intense local and regional battles to convince everyday Nigerians that the time had come to embrace a change in national leadership.
The seasoned politician served as the Director-General of Muhammadu Buhari’s presidential campaign organisation during both the historic 2015 push and the subsequent 2019 re-election bid. Furthermore, he stood as one of the chief visionaries and structural pillars behind the sweeping coalition of G-5 governors and splinter political blocs that formally broke away from the PDP to lay the foundational bricks of the All Progressives Congress.
Amaechi’s latest commentary directly challenges the famous political narrative established by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu prior to the 2023 presidential elections. During a series of highly publicized campaign outings—most notably his historic address in Abeokuta, Ogun State—Tinubu had argued forcefully that Buhari’s repeated presidential ambitions would have repeatedly collapsed without the deployment of his formidable southwestern political structure, financial networks, and personal influence.
By breaking his years of silence just as the political machinery for the 2027 electoral cycle begins to accelerate, Amaechi’s explosive interview serves a dual purpose. It not only updates the historical narrative of the 2015 merger but also signals his intention to aggressively contest the political legacy and current governance philosophy of the ruling administration from his new vantage point within the African Democratic Congress (ADC).
