APC Unites 500 Women Groups As 2027 Campaign Shifts To The Grassroots

APC Unites 500 Women Groups As 2027 Campaign Shifts To The Grassroots

Princess-Ekwi Ajide

The battle for women’s votes in Nigeria’s 2027 elections is already moving beyond Abuja’s political halls, with the APC seeking to turn hundreds of independent support groups into a coordinated grassroots campaign network.

More than 500 women support groups from the six geopolitical zones formally joined the APC Presidential Campaign Council Women Wing and declared support for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s re-election bid at a mobilisation and empowerment summit in Abuja on Monday.

Convened by First Lady Senator Oluremi Tinubu at the Bola Ahmed Tinubu International Conference Centre, the summit brought together APC women leaders, state representatives, political organisers and grassroots mobilisers.

The development is part of a wider strategy to take the 2027 campaign into wards, communities and households.

The APC Women Mobilisation Directorate says its grassroots structure currently covers 176,846 communities nationwide, with door-to-door engagement and community meetings already under way.

It has also announced a target of 40 million women votes for the Tinubu-Shettima ticket.

Those figures are campaign targets, not evidence of actual voter preferences. But they show the scale of the organisation the ruling party is trying to build.

The summit, themed “Renewed Hope Agenda 2.0: From Reforms to Prosperity,” also linked political mobilisation with economic empowerment. Women beneficiaries received items including tricycles, sewing machines, refrigerators and agricultural equipment.

APC National Women Leader Mary Alile Idele urged women to take the administration’s policies and opportunities from government programmes to families, markets and communities.

The First Lady also announced plans for six zonal mega rallies, culminating in a national rally in Abuja, giving the mobilisation a structure across Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones.

But the real test will come after the Abuja gathering.

The political machinery will have to convert speeches and endorsements into sustained conversations with voters, particularly women whose concerns may centre on food prices, household income, jobs, education, healthcare and small businesses.

There is also a wider question about women’s place in the 2027 contest.

Their role as voters and campaign mobilisers is increasingly prominent, but whether that influence translates into greater representation as candidates and decision-makers remains to be seen.

For the APC, Monday’s summit was therefore less about the size of the crowd than the structure being built behind it.

The next phase will take the campaign from the conference centre to the wards, communities and homes, where political loyalty is tested one voter at a time.