The Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential candidate in the 2023 election, Prince Adewole Adebayo, has called on Nigerians to stop recycling old politicians if the country is to witness meaningful progress.
Speaking on Nigeria’s challenges, Adebayo blamed the elite, particularly the political class, for the nation’s woes. He stressed that true national renewal requires embracing new leaders with fresh ideas rather than depending on old faces.
Using a metaphor, he said: “If you don’t like spots, then you don’t need to bring leopards because leopards cannot change their spots.”
According to him, a country grappling with 70 percent poverty, poor infrastructure, and weak institutions cannot afford to remain conservative. Instead, Nigerians must open their doors to innovation and fresh leadership.
“When new politicians come with new ideas, we should not be too conservative as a society because conservatism is about consolidating on progress, whether obtained lawfully or wrongly. But Nigeria has nothing to consolidate. You need new ideas and new leadership to renew yourself,” he said.
Adebayo argued that politics in Nigeria has become self-serving, with politicians merely fighting for power rather than seeking genuine governance reforms. He noted that less than two percent of Nigerians are politicians, leaving the country’s future in the hands of the 98 percent majority.
Aligning with former Kaduna State governor, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, who recently described the All Progressives Congress (APC) government as failed, clannish, and visionless, Adebayo said El-Rufai was only repeating what he had consistently maintained since 2022.
“He is not saying anything new. He’s saying what I said in 2022/23 in 2025, after many waters have crossed his own bridge. So, he’s echoing me now. I can’t charge him for copyright, but I can say welcome to the club,” Adebayo remarked.
He further warned that Nigeria’s economic crisis cannot be resolved by merely changing political party names without altering the tendencies in authority.
“The results we are getting from the APC in the last 10 years resemble the unsatisfactory results we got under the PDP for 16 years. If these results must change, we must change the tendencies in authority. Simply changing the party without changing its political tendency is mere nomenclature,” he concluded.
