If Religion Must Decide Elections, Then Let the South Answer With Its Own Political Choice
So, let us decide to go a little religious—and perhaps deliberately fanatic—for the purpose of this political argument.
The 2026 Osun governorship election has presented Nigerians with an interesting opportunity to examine the increasingly uncomfortable relationship between religion and politics.
Ahead of the election, some Muslim groups and clerics openly argued that Muslim voters should reject Governor Ademola Adeleke. The Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC), for instance, accused Adeleke of religious marginalisation and urged Muslims to reconsider giving him another term. MURIC’s position was based largely on its assessment of the governor’s relationship with Muslim interests and representation.
Other Muslim stakeholders in Osun went further, endorsing the APC candidate, Bola Oyebamiji, while citing what they described as the need for religious balance in the state.
And now, after the votes have been counted and Adeleke has been declared the winner, an interesting question remains.
Who exactly voted for Adeleke?
This question becomes particularly provocative when we consider Iwo, a town widely recognised as having a significant Muslim population and a strong Islamic identity. Political arguments suggesting that Muslims should vote against Adeleke would naturally make Adeleke's performance in Iwo particularly interesting.
Were those voters Christians?
Were they Muslims?
Or were they simply Nigerians who decided that their political choice should not be dictated by their religious identity?
The truth is that, under Nigeria's secret-ballot system, nobody can accurately determine the religion of individual voters from election results. What the result demonstrates, however, is that religious identity does not automatically produce uniform political behaviour.
Indeed, Adeleke's administration had actively highlighted projects and interventions in Iwoland during the campaign, including road construction, the dualisation of Odo-Ori–Adeke Road, reconstruction of the Adeke Bridge and other infrastructure projects.
That brings us to the bigger question.
If religious arithmetic is going to become the basis for political mobilisation, where exactly does that argument end?
Let us now take the argument beyond Osun and into the wider Nigerian political conversation.
Recent controversy surrounding Sheikh Sani Yahaya Jingir has again brought the Muslim-Muslim ticket and religious identity into the national spotlight. Reports and widely circulated recordings of remarks attributed to the cleric have generated strong reactions over comments concerning Christians and his call for Muslims to mobilise politically ahead of 2027.
Whatever one's religious or political persuasion, this kind of rhetoric deserves serious scrutiny because Nigeria is constitutionally a secular state in which citizens are entitled to practise and profess their faith without being politically reduced to it.
And this is where I want to take the argument in the opposite direction.
If some people are prepared to mobilise voters primarily on religious considerations, then I, too, reserve the right to make my own political choice from my own perspective.
Therefore, I am particularly interested in going a little “fanatic” myself.
As a Christian, I am throwing my full political weight behind Bimbo Adekanmbi of the Allied Peoples Movement (APM) for the 2027 Oyo State governorship election.
Adekanmbi has already been formally affirmed by the APM as its 2027 governorship candidate. His emergence followed the party's governorship primary in Ibadan, where he was adopted as the consensus candidate.
But let me be clear: this is not a call for Christians to vote against Muslims.
Far from it.
It is a political response to the growing attempt to turn religion into an electoral weapon.
If the North chooses to continue producing Muslim governors and political leaders based on the preferences of its electorate, that is its democratic choice.
But let the South-West also preserve what has traditionally made it different: religious tolerance, political liberalism and the freedom to choose leaders across religious lines.
Let a Muslim vote for a Christian.
Let a Christian vote for a Muslim.
Let Muslims vote for Muslims if they genuinely believe that candidate is best.
And let Christians vote for Christians if they genuinely believe that candidate deserves their support.
But ultimately, competence should matter more than creed.
Because if Nigeria allows religion to become the primary qualification for political leadership, we may eventually discover that we have created a country where Christians and Muslims are no longer competing over who can govern better—but over who has the bigger religious population.
That is a dangerous road.
So, if the North wants its Muslim governors, let the North have them.
And if I choose to support Bimbo Adekanmbi in Oyo, let that also be my democratic right.
The better Nigeria, however, is one where nobody has to vote according to religion at all.
Let the North vote for competence. Let the South vote for competence. Let Muslims vote for competence. Let Christians vote for competence. And above all, let Nigerians vote freely.
0 Comments