By Mohammed Bello Doka
11 October, 2026.
On December 3, 2023, a Nigerian Army drone struck Tudun Biri in Igabi Local Government Area of Kaduna State, killing at least 85 civilians who had gathered for a religious celebration. Among the dead were women, children, and the elderly. President Bola Tinubu did not visit. On September 2024, another military airstrike hit Giwa Local Government Area, killing at least 24 more civilians in what the military called a mistaken targeting of bandits. President Tinubu did not visit. In September 2025, bandits descended on Kachia Local Government Area and abducted 152 people in a single operation. President Tinubu did not visit. In July 2025, windstorms and heavy rainfall devastated five local government areas, displacing 6,172 people and killing six. President Tinubu did not visit. In August 2024, bandits attacked communities in Kajuru Local Government Area, killing four, injuring three, and abducting thirty-seven. President Tinubu did not visit. In September 2025, floods submerged parts of Zaria Local Government Area, affecting 476 people. President Tinubu did not visit.
Now, after three and a half years of blood, tears, and silence, the APC has chosen Kaduna as the launchpad for its 2027 presidential campaign. The same Kaduna where 85 people were buried in a mass grave after a Nigerian drone bombed them. The same Kaduna where 152 people were carted away into forests by bandits while the president was in Lagos commissioning buses. The same Kaduna where communities have been orphaned by airstrikes, emptied by kidnappings, and drowned by floods. What exactly is Tinubu coming to tell the people of Kaduna? What is he coming to promise again?
Since May 29, 2023, President Tinubu has visited Kaduna exactly twice. The first was a one-day working visit in June 2025 to commission a vocational training institute, a 300-bed specialist hospital, and 100 CNG buses, most of which were state government projects. The second was a private visit in September 2025 to attend a wedding and condole with the widow of a former president. Two visits in three and a half years. Not one of those visits was to console the victims of Tudun Biri. Not one was to visit the families of the 152 abducted in Kachia. Not one was to assess the damage in Giwa after another military misfire. Not one was to stand with the flood victims in Zaria. Not one was to confront the bandits in Kajuru. Instead, he flew to Kaduna for a wedding, shook hands, took photographs, and flew back to Abuja.
Compare that to his attention to Lagos. In Lagos, Tinubu has commissioned the first 30 kilometres of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway, a project estimated at over one trillion naira. In Lagos, he has rehabilitated the Third Mainland Bridge at a cost of 43 billion naira and built a 2.5 billion naira CCTV monitoring centre. In Lagos, he inaugurated the Red Line Rail, a 37-kilometre project costing over 135 million dollars. In Lagos, he commissioned CNG infrastructure in Ojota, part of a 100 billion naira national rollout, with four major projects in a single day. In Lagos, the Abuja-Kaduna-Zaria-Kano road, a project inherited from Buhari, was revoked and re-awarded at a higher cost, while the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway received 43 billion naira for phase two. Lagos is where the president’s heart beats. Kaduna is where his promises go to die.
What is he coming to promise again? Will he promise to rebuild Tudun Biri, a resettlement scheme that was already completed and commissioned in January 2026, months before his campaign flag-off? Will he promise to complete the Abuja-Kaduna road that his administration revoked, re-awarded at 752 billion naira, and now claims will be finished by November 2026, just in time for the election? Will he promise the Kaduna Light Rail, a project still in the mobilisation phase, with contractors yet to fully break ground? Will he promise the Mando-Birnin Gwari road, flagged off in August 2026 with a 24-month completion window, meaning it will not be finished until after the votes are counted? What exactly is new? What exactly is sincere? What exactly is not a campaign prop?
The Northwest is the de facto capital of poverty in Nigeria. The National Bureau of Statistics reports a multidimensional poverty rate of 75.8 percent in the region, second only to the Northeast. The Cadre Harmonisé report shows 4.2 million people in the Northwest facing crisis-level food insecurity, with projections rising to 5 million in the 2026 lean season. UNICEF data shows primary school net attendance in the Northwest at just 47.3 percent, meaning more than half of school-age children are out of the classroom. Human Rights Watch, citing SBM Intelligence, recorded 2,938 kidnappings in the Northwest between July 2024 and June 2025, over 60 percent of the national total, with Kaduna alone recording 629 cases. Nigeria Watch recorded 3,974 deaths from rural banditry in 2025, more than double the figure for 2024. These are not political talking points. These are institutional figures. And yet, in the face of this avalanche of suffering, the president has been absent.
What will he tell the mother in Tudun Biri who lost her children to a Nigerian drone? What will he tell the father in Kachia whose family was abducted and never returned? What will he tell the farmer in Kajuru who buried his brothers after bandits attacked? What will he tell the flood victim in Zaria who lost everything? What will he tell the millions of out-of-school children roaming the streets of Kaduna while he commissions rail lines in Lagos? What will he tell the hungry, the poor, the abandoned, the forgotten? What will he promise again?
He will promise roads. He will promise rail. He will promise security. He will promise jobs. He will promise a better future. He will promise everything he promised in 2023 and failed to deliver. He will stand on a stage in Kaduna, surrounded by governors and senators and party chieftains, and he will tell the people that he cares. He will tell them that he has not forgotten them. He will tell them that the best is yet to come. And then he will fly back to Lagos, where the projects are real, where the money flows, where his people live.
Kaduna is not a campaign stop. Kaduna is a crime scene. And the man who is coming to campaign there is the same man who ignored the bodies, ignored the abductions, ignored the floods, ignored the hunger, ignored the children, ignored the pain. He ignored it all for three and a half years. Now he wants their votes. What will he promise again? What will he say that has not already been said? What will he do that has not already been abandoned? The people of Kaduna are waiting. But they are not waiting for promises. They are waiting for justice. They are waiting for a president who shows up when it matters, not when it is convenient. They are waiting for a leader who sees their suffering, not one who sees their votes. Will Tinubu be that leader? Or will he come, wave, promise, and disappear again?
Mohammed Bello Doka can be reached via bellodoka82@gmail.com
Abuja Network News
