In the early hours of Friday, 29th May 2026, one time governor of Kano State and the strong man of Kano politics, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, unveiled Aminu Abdulsalam Gwarzo, erstwhile deputy governor of the state, as the gubernatorial candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in Kano State for the 2027 general elections.

The announcement was made at the end of a stakeholders meeting that lasted from Thursday night into the early hours of Friday at Kwankwaso’s Bompai residence in the state capital. A statement affirming Gwarzo’s choice as the consensus candidate of the NDC was subsequently issued by Ibrahim Garba Shuaibu, Gwarzo’s press secretary, who added that Gwarzo would be formally affirmed alongside other NDC candidates at the party’s affirmation ceremony.

In the same arrangement, Nasiru Yusuf Gawuna, the APC governorship candidate in the 2023 elections who recently defected to the NDC, was nominated as the party’s candidate for the Kano Central Senatorial District.

The unveiling of the governorship candidate of the NDC in the state had been long awaited in political circles. Now that it has been announced, it has set the stage for a titanic battle between incumbent Governor Abba Kabiru Yusuf and his erstwhile deputy, Aminu Abdulsalam Gwarzo. The relationship between both men has been frosty, and the stiff rivalry between both gladiators has been described by political watchers as a grudge war where pride, ego, public interests and political heritage will all be staked.

Gwarzo, in his acceptance speech after being officially affirmed as the NDC candidate, vowed to deny his former principal the opportunity of a second term, declaring that the battle line had been drawn and that the governor had only one term to spend in office.

The battle for Kano Government House will be escalated by the shared history of both men. Several years ago, both served as equally ranked junior associates of Kwankwaso. While Abba, who was also related to Kwankwaso by marriage, handled Kwankwaso’s personal and private affairs, Gwarzo was in charge of his official affairs, rising to the rank of Chief of Staff at Kano Government House.

When Kwankwaso completed his two broken terms as governor between 1999 and 2003 and between 2011 and 2015, he reluctantly settled for his deputy, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, as his successor. But the script that played out months afterwards proved that the choice of Ganduje was wrong. Ganduje swiftly parted ways with Kwankwaso, asserted his independence and affirmed himself as a political rival.

Lost in the lurch, Kwankwaso reverted to his two trusted junior associates, Gwarzo and Abba, and together they revived the spirit of Kwankwassiyya and landed themselves in Government House eight years after. It is noteworthy that while Abba was the governorship candidate and the face of the party, Gwarzo headed the Kwankwasiyya Movement, which was the soul of the struggle, contributing significantly towards the transformation of the NNPP into a formidable political force in the state.

The years after securing power in 2023 were difficult for both gladiators. They were characterised by a swirling dust of distrust and conflict, fanned by divergence of views, fear of overshadowing the other, betrayed trust and unfulfilled yearnings. Although theirs was not a regular, rugged political clash foregrounded in newspaper headlines, it was nevertheless a crushing, ruthless silent battle, which led to the slashing of financial allocations to the office of the deputy governor and the unceremonious dropping of Gwarzo as Commissioner of Local Government Area.

The last straw that shattered the camel’s back emerged from the defection and realignment saga in the state, occasioned by the need to deliver higher votes for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in 2027. While Governor Abba conveniently defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in January 2026, Gwarzo stayed with Kwankwaso, an act of loyalty that proved itself a mortal sin to Governor Abba and the APC, for which he was made to pay with his position.

The resignation saga was not seamless and did not come without breathtaking drama. Gwarzo stubbornly remained in office until March 5th, 2026, staying put until he was served with an impeachment notice by the Kano State House of Assembly. The allegations against him included gross misconduct, abuse of office and breach of public trust, including receiving a kickback of N462 million from the 44 local government areas between June 2023 and January 2024, diverting the sum of N736 million under the guise of special assignments and improperly releasing N440 million to Novomed Pharmaceutical Ltd contrary to state procurement laws.

Gwarzo subsequently filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Kano on March 25th, 2026, seeking to halt the impeachment process, but was unsuccessful. He eventually withdrew the case and tendered his resignation, thereafter joining the African Democratic Congress alongside Kwankwaso before both subsequently moved to the NDC, where Gwarzo was positioned as the preferred candidate of the Kwankwasiyya group, reportedly due to his loyalty and alignment with Kwankwaso’s political philosophy.

Gwarzo’s resignation, at the time he did, was regarded as a wise political move, at least saving him from being indicted by a House of Assembly whose neutrality at that time was not guaranteed. Today, Gwarzo is back on the big stage, looking finer, stronger and better prepared for the battle ahead. His camp says that under his watch, Kano State would be blessed with uncommon prosperity, peace and progress, and that the present decoration of hunger, lack, misgovernance, insecurity and thuggery with calculated propaganda would be a thing of the past.

His press secretary, Ibrahim Garba Shuaibu, cited a resume that includes his position as deputy governor, service as commissioner across four ministries, membership of the National Assembly Service Commission, chairmanship of the Governing Board of the Federal College of Education, Kontagora, and the position of National Vice President of ALGON between 2000 and 2002.

Gwarzo’s biggest asset in the political battle of 2027 may come from his alignment with Kwankwaso, who remains a substantive political threat in Kano State, having personally won the governorship twice and having won it a third time with Abba as his front.

The spokesman of the Kwankwasiyya Movement, Habib Saleh Mailemo, maintained that Gwarzo’s emergence was seamless and that Gawuna was fully part of the decision making process, saying: “He was not only consulted, he was actually part of the entire process to the end.”

Anthony Audu, a resident of the Sabon Garri area in the state, also referenced the candidacy of Peter Obi as a factor that would favour Gwarzo enormously, arguing that the non indigene communities, the majority of whom are Igbo, control about 15 per cent of the total available votes in the state and that the last four years under Abba had not been the best of times for those communities, with poor roads, dry pumps and almost zero educational support defining their daily experience.

Governor Abba, for his part, shows no signs of yielding. He was adopted as the APC consensus governorship candidate at an elaborate party congress held at the Sani Abacha Stadium in Kano, attended by party leaders, elected officials, delegates and enthusiastic supporters, with Deputy Senate President Barau Jibrin moving the motion for his affirmation and describing him as having demonstrated exceptional leadership and unwavering commitment to the development of Kano State.

Addressing a large crowd of supporters upon his return from APC activities in Abuja, the governor dismissed the chances of opposition parties, declaring: “APC in Kano State is the only winning party. There is no other party that can take control of Kano and Nigeria, by the grace of Allah.”

Governor Abba holds the considerable advantages of incumbency, federal backing and the formidable machinery of the APC. A Kano resident, Abubakar Iro, captured the complexity of the contest, noting that while Kwankwaso remains one of the most influential political figures in the state, Abba now has performance credentials that voters may consider.

“Looking at how difficult it was for Kwankwaso to secure Abba Kabir Yusuf’s victory after a prolonged legal battle, it will be tough for him to dislodge those in power now, especially after they have aligned with Ganduje,” he said.

The battle for Kano in 2027 is therefore not a simple contest between two men. It is a proxy war between two political worlds, a settling of accounts between a mentor and his most consequential political son, a reckoning between loyalty and pragmatism, and ultimately a test of whether the Kwankwasiyya movement retains enough structural potency to reclaim what it once built.

How both gladiators respond to the challenges ahead will go a long way to determining whether Gwarzo dislodges Abba or whether the incumbent writes a new chapter in the long, turbulent political story of Kano State. (The Sun)

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