Atiku asks “Do I look 80?” after a BBC Hausa question on his fitness for 2027, and says Peter Obi and Rabiu Kwankwaso left his coalition
African Democratic Congress presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar dismissed questions about his age in a BBC Hausa interview published on Friday 28 August 2026, asking whether he looked like a man of 80.
Also read: Tinubu Aide Says 2027 May Be Atiku’s Last Shot
The interviewer noted that Atiku Abubakar would be almost 80 by the 2027 presidential election and asked if that would weaken four years of leadership. Atiku Abubakar, born on 25 November 1946, turns 80 this November.
He turned the point on President Bola Tinubu. “You went and voted for someone who is 80, I mean 90 years old. How old is President Bola, 90?” Official records list President Tinubu’s date of birth as 29 March 1952, which would make him 74.
When the interviewer said the president was not yet 80, Atiku Abubakar replied: “Do I look to you like someone who has reached 80 years of age?”
The exchange sits on a longer record. He has already called 2027 his last run and said no doctor had declared him unfit.
He also rejected the charge that he had blocked a wider opposition alliance. “That is a baseless accusation levelled against me. I was actually the one who initiated the coalition. Nobody else. I, Atiku Abubakar, started it.”
He said most of those who began the project were still together. He named NNPP figure Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and former Labour Party candidate Peter Obi as the main names who had walked away. “It was just Kwankwaso. He was with us at first, then he left.” On Peter Obi: “Yes, and also Peter Obi. It’s just them, but the rest of us are still here continuing our work.”
He left a door open. “Nothing is impossible, by God’s grace. One day you’ll see. We have agreed to work together to save this country and its poor citizens, Insha Allah.”
On the economy he repeated his attack on subsidy removal. “I did not oppose the removal of the oil subsidy, but where is the money? Where did it go?” He alleged theft and said: “If elected, I will bring back the oil subsidy, and whoever stole the money must refund it.”
Age, coalition and petrol prices are now one pitch. Critics will hear a man arguing with the calendar.
Also read: Tinubu Aide Says 2027 May Be Atiku’s Last Shot
Supporters will hear a candidate who still wants the argument settled at the ballot, not in a studio.
