NOW THAT SHETTIMA IS NO LONGER WANTED.... — Mohammed Bello Doka

Shettima and Tinubu 

 How does a sitting Vice-President become invisible in his own party?

Who keeps removing his image from official programmes—and why does nobody correct it?

At what point does silence become policy, omission become intention, and coincidence become design?

And if power has already moved on, why does the Vice-President remain, smiling beside a door that is quietly being shut?

These are not idle questions. They go to the heart of power, democracy, and institutional dignity in Nigeria today.

What began as murmurs has hardened into a pattern: repeated APC programmes—national, zonal, and stakeholder meetings—centred on President Bola Tinubu increasingly carry no image of the Vice-President. Not once. Not twice. Repeatedly. In different regions. Over time. Without correction. Without apology. Without explanation.

In Nigerian politics, visuals are not decorations. They are declarations. Posters, banners, backdrops, and stage designs are deliberate acts of messaging. They tell insiders who matters, who is protected, who is ascendant—and who is expendable. When a party consistently erases the face of its elected deputy from official imagery, it is making a statement louder than any press release.

The North-East saw it first, and loudly. At APC events in the region, banners bearing the President’s image omitted the Vice-President’s. Protests followed. State legislators complained. Party members raised alarms. Yet the national party did nothing. No redesigns. No rebukes. No insistence on balance. Silence settled like a verdict.

Then it happened elsewhere. In the South-East, similar omissions occurred at stakeholders’ meetings. There was less noise—no surprise there. The Vice-President is not from the South-East; local actors did not feel personally slighted. Media attention drifted. But the fact remained: the omission travelled. It replicated. It endured.

Most damning of all, APC national programmes built squarely around Tinubu’s presidency now routinely exclude the Vice-President altogether. The pattern has become systemic.

At this point, insisting it is accidental strains credulity.

Supporters of Kashim Shettima respond with a familiar refrain: he is the undisputed leader of the APC in the North-East. The claim is repeated often, loudly, and defensively. But repetition is not reality. Power in the North-East APC is fragmented—shared among sitting governors who control party machinery, former governors with entrenched networks, national party officials, and presidential loyalists who answer directly to Aso Rock, not the Vice-President.

A truly uncontested regional leader does not watch his image disappear from party banners in his own zone. He does not rely on state legislators to protest on his behalf while the party hierarchy looks away. He does not need explanations offered after the fact by spokesmen scrambling to justify the unjustifiable.

This is where rhetoric collapses under optics.

What is unfolding is best described as systematic marginalisation—deliberate sidelining carried out not through open confrontation, but through quiet erasure. It is institutional, not emotional. Calculated, not chaotic. And it goes far beyond Shettima as a person.

The Vice-Presidency is a constitutional office. It is elected. It is part of a joint mandate sold to voters as a package of balance, inclusion, and shared responsibility. When a ruling party treats that office as optional—when it visually airbrushes it out of relevance—it insults the institution itself.

This is not merely disrespect. It is abuse of office—not by the Vice-President, but against the office he occupies.

The man and the Snake 

Worse still, it is an abuse of democratic principles. Democracy is not sustained by ballots alone; it survives on institutional respect. When power is personalised to the point where elected offices can be downgraded without explanation, democracy tilts toward one-man rule optics. Institutions weaken. Precedents rot. Today the Vice-President is erased; tomorrow, governors, legislators, or voters themselves may be quietly written out.

One would expect the guardians of institutions to push back. Instead, many have become cheerleaders to power. Those who should defend the Vice-Presidency now rationalise its erosion. Silence is framed as strategy. Compliance as wisdom. Applause replaces principle.

At the same time, another drama plays out in the shadows: ambition. While the office is being weakened, aspirants quietly position themselves to replace its current occupant. They study the vacancy, not the vandalism. They treat Shettima’s experience as opportunity, not warning. They ask, “How do I take the seat?” instead of “Why is the seat being hollowed out?”

This is a profound misreading of power.

History suggests that what is happening is structural, not personal. Tinubu’s long political memory offers little evidence of enduring, empowering relationships with deputies. As Lagos governor, no deputy emerged stronger at the end of the relationship. Deputies were useful, not sovereign; instrumental, not equal. Proximity to power did not guarantee protection. Loyalty did not translate into permanence.

Seen through that lens, Shettima’s marginalisation looks less like an aberration and more like continuity.

This does not make it right. It makes it predictable.

Which brings us to the most uncomfortable question of all: if the party has already moved on, why hasn’t the Vice-President?

Why cling to a structure that has quietly signalled disinterest? Why remain tethered to a party that visually excludes you from its future? Why defend unity when the symbols of unity have been dismantled around you? Why insist on belonging when belonging is no longer reciprocated?

Some will argue patience. Others will cite loyalty. A few will invoke destiny. But politics is not poetry. It is power. And power communicates clearly—especially when it stops speaking altogether.

There is a deeper irony here. By staying silent, by absorbing indignities without consequence, the Vice-President inadvertently helps normalise the abuse of his own office. Each unchallenged omission becomes precedent. Each rationalised slight becomes acceptable practice. The institution weakens further.

And those cheering today may discover tomorrow that the same tools—erasure, silence, sidelining—have been sharpened for their use.

Replacing Shettima will not solve this problem. It will merely reset the cycle. Whoever follows him may inherit the seat, but not its dignity. Without institutional respect, the next deputy will face the same vulnerability, the same conditional relevance, the same quiet disposal when convenience demands it.

This is why the real tragedy here is not personal. It is institutional. When offices lose dignity, democracy loses ballast. When defenders become applauders, power loses restraint. When ambition ignores lessons, history repeats—more boldly, more efficiently, and with fewer witnesses.

So we return to the question that refuses to go away: now that Shettima appears no longer wanted, why cling to a dead horse?

Is it hope? Is it calculation? Or is it the tragic belief that loyalty will eventually be rewarded by a structure that has already decided otherwise?

Nigeria deserves better than silent erosions and quiet humiliations. The Vice-Presidency deserves better than visual disappearance. And democracy deserves institutions that are defended regardless of who occupies them.

If this moment teaches anything, it is this: power rarely announces rejection. It simply stops remembering you exist.

Mohammed Bello Doka can be reached via bellodoka82@gmail.com

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