Rotimi Amaechi, the African Democratic Congress’s vice-presidential candidate alongside Atiku Abubakar in the 2027 election, said Friday he would abandon the ticket and campaign for President Bola Tinubu if the pump price of petrol fell to N600 per litre, using the figure as a benchmark to challenge the administration’s economic record.
Speaking on Channels Television’s “Politics Today,” the former Rivers State governor and ex-transportation minister said he would personally visit a filling station to verify whether petrol had reached that price, and invited skeptics to accompany him with a camera to confirm the outcome. He framed the pledge as a direct test of Tinubu’s recent Independence Day claim that Nigerians are experiencing a new era of economic prosperity, arguing the government should demonstrate tangible relief rather than assert it.
Amaechi criticized the removal of the petrol subsidy in 2023 for worsening living costs without adequate cushioning measures, and separately said he did not believe Tinubu would seek to rig the 2027 election, warning that any manipulation of the process could carry serious consequences for the country. He also noted that his running mate, Atiku, has pledged to reintroduce a form of petrol subsidy, tied to a proposed crude oil production subsidy, if elected president.
Petrol prices have remained a central flashpoint in Nigeria’s political debate since the 2023 subsidy removal, with pump prices in parts of Abuja recently reported at roughly N1,395 to N1,450 per litre, according to September figures. Amaechi’s conditional pledge adds fuel pricing to a list of economic benchmarks likely to feature prominently in campaigning ahead of the 2027 vote, in which Atiku and Amaechi are running against Tinubu on the All Progressives Congress platform.
