Rabiu Kwankwaso, the NDC's vice-presidential candidate running alongside Peter Obi in the 2027 election, used a BBC Igbo interview this week to call for renewed unity between Nigeria's North and South-East. His central message: it's time for the country to move past old grievances and rebuild the political alliance between the two regions.

Kwankwaso urged the North and South-East to forgive each other and work together as a family, describing the South-East as a longstanding ally. He framed this not as a new idea, but as a return to a pattern set by earlier generations of Nigerian leaders.

Leaning on History

To make his case, Kwankwaso pointed to several past examples of North–South-East cooperation:

The First Republic alliance between the Northern People's Congress and Nnamdi Azikiwe's National Council of Nigerian Citizens.

Ties between President Shehu Shagari's National Party of Nigeria and South-East politicians during the Second Republic.

The decision by the NPN, a Northern-led party, to welcome former Biafran leader Odumegwu Ojukwu back into democratic politics after the Civil War, even inviting him to run for a Senate seat, which he lost. Kwankwaso said Northern leaders chose to forgive and move forward with him despite his history as Biafra's leader.

He also spoke personally about the late Vice President Alex Ekwueme, calling him a longtime friend of the North and recalling that he attended Ekwueme's burial in Anambra State.

Kwankwaso was careful to frame the North–South-East push as additive, not divisive. He said closer ties with the South-East aren't a slight against the South-West or any other region, insisting all zones remain friends. No single ethnic or religious group can succeed in national politics without broad-based cooperation across the country.

The remarks land squarely in pre-2027 election positioning. Kwankwaso is Peter Obi's running mate on the NDC ticket, and shoring up Northern support for a Northern–South-East coalition