President Bola Tinubu’s re-election campaign received a major boost in Ekiti State on Thursday, as governorship candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Dr. Wole Oluyede, Social Democratic Party (SDP) Livelihood Adedayo, and Allied Peoples Movement (APM) Chief Joseph Anifowose, declared support for his second-term bid.
The opposition candidates announced their backing at the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign rally in Ado-Ekiti on Thursday, where Governor Biodun Oyebanji pledged that the state would deliver at least 90 per cent of its votes for Tinubu in the January 16, 2027 presidential election.
Vice President Kashim Shettima, representing the President, set an even broader target of 90% to 95% of ballots cast in a state with roughly 1.03 million registered voters.
The APC’s goal is ambitious by electoral standards.
In 2023, the party won all 16 local government areas in Ekiti and received 201,495 votes; Shettima urged supporters to improve on that result.
Senator Abdulaziz Yari, Director-General of the APC Presidential Campaign Council (PCC), went further, asking the state to deliver 800,000 votes, about 90% of the expected total, citing more than 900,000 collected voter cards among 1.08 million registered voters.
The endorsements carried symbolic weight in a state where Oyebanji’s rivals had contested the June election against him.
Oluyede said the Governor’s record had brought stakeholders together and urged residents to support Tinubu, whom he described as generous to Ekiti.
Vice President Shettima described the show of unity as evidence of the APC’s expanding political strength, while Oyebanji said the backing of former opponents and past governors would strengthen the party’s campaign.
Party leaders used the rally to defend the administration’s economic program.
APC National Chairman Nentawe Yilwatda pointed to infrastructure, including a road linking Ekiti and Akure, and said small businesses and individuals earning below 100 million naira annually had been exempted from tax under the government’s reforms.
Former Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomhole cited education expansion, student loans, worker welfare and security recruitment as reasons to re-elect Tinubu, challenging opposition parties to articulate a different agenda.
The rally also drew Ondo Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa, Lagos Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Senate Leader Opeyemi Bamidele and former Ekiti governors Ayodele Fayose, Kayode Fayemi and Niyi Adebayo –an alignment of state and federal political figures that the APC hopes will translate into a decisive margin in January, 2027
