Do Not Erase El-Rufai’s Role In Your 2023 Election Victory – Onoh Tells Tinubu

Former Southeast spokesman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council, Denge Josef Onoh, has urged President Bola Tinubu to intervene in the situation of former Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai.

Onoh urged Tinubu to grant prioritize reconciliation and statesmanship in dealing with the former governor’s situation.

Naija News reports that Onoh spoke in an open letter dated September 24, 2026, addressed to Tinubu through the President’s Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila.

He stated that El-Rufai’s contributions to the APC and the 2023 presidential campaign should not be forgotten, recalling that he served as a key figure in the campaign that produced Tinubu as president.

He said: “We cannot quickly erase from our memories the immense, foundational role Mallam El-Rufai played in ensuring the victory of the All Progressives Congress and your historic election in 2023.”

Onoh acknowledged that El-Rufai could be difficult to work with, describing him as “rigid, intensely opinionated, and notoriously difficult to align with,” but said those qualities had also reflected his loyalty when committed to a cause or friendship.

He expressed concern that some of El-Rufai’s friends and associates had allegedly distanced themselves from him because of political considerations.

Onoh said he was unwilling to remain silent because of political pressure, adding that he continued to regard El-Rufai as a friend whose contributions to nation-building deserved recognition.

He urged Tinubu to draw lessons from historical examples of political reconciliation, citing Julius Caesar’s policy of clemency towards political opponents and former President Shehu Shagari’s pardon of the late Biafran leader, Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, in 1982.

According to Onoh, such actions demonstrated that political leadership could use mercy and reconciliation to heal divisions.

Onoh said Tinubu’s intervention in El-Rufai’s case “would not be an act of weakness” but a demonstration of statesmanship and political maturity.

“Leaving a former ally and a key architect of our current democratic dispensation to languish in confinement risks deepening political fractures at a time when our country desperately needs structural stability and unity,” he said.

He appealed to Tinubu to choose what he described as “reconciliation over retribution” and “compassion over confinement.”

Onoh concluded by urging the President to ensure that the situation became an opportunity for national healing rather than further political division.

“Please, let us get value out of this. It matters,” he said.