Vice President Kashim Shettima has called on transport operators mobilising support for President Bola Tinubu’s 2027 re-election bid to keep their activities peaceful and focused on issues, warning that no political goal is served by disorder or intimidation.
Shettima spoke on Monday at the inauguration of the national working committee and nationwide structures of Transporters for Tinubu/Shettima 2027 (TFT 2027), held at the Old Banquet Hall, Presidential Villa, Abuja. He was represented by the Chief of Staff to the President in the Office of the Vice President, Senator Ibrahim Hadeija.
Addressing the group, Shettima urged transporters to use their nationwide networks to promote unity, counter misinformation, and encourage responsible political participation as they campaign for his and Tinubu’s re-election.
“As you set out for this nationwide assignment, I appeal to each of you to remember that political participation places an obligation on those who organise others,” he said.
He cautioned against threats, intimidation and electoral misconduct, insisting that political contests must be won through peaceful, issue-based engagement rather than fear or disorder. Elections, he said, should be treated as a democratic contest of ideas and not as warfare.
“Nigeria’s future must be argued in the open, tested by citizens and decided through credible elections,” he said.
The Vice President praised the transporters for uniting operators across road, rail, aviation, maritime, motorbike, logistics and pipeline transport, describing the sector as central to the economy since it determines how efficiently farmers, manufacturers, traders and students move goods and reach their destinations.
He linked the administration’s investments in highways, railways, ports and clean mobility to this economic role, calling transport operators “parallel ambassadors of the nation” and urging them to partner with government to improve road safety, enforce traffic rules, and adopt new technologies reshaping the industry.
Speaking earlier, the transporters pledged to deliver more than 20 million votes for the Tinubu-Shettima ticket in 2027. The Technical Adviser on Transportation, Logistics and Innovation in the Office of the Vice President, Dr Segun Obayendo, said the group was building a digital membership database and structures spanning the 36 states, the FCT, and all 774 local government areas.
Obayendo said the initiative was born out of the recognition that transport operators had long supported governments individually without reaping collective political benefit. “We started putting our structures together and realised that politics without structure is labour without coordination,” he said, describing the new coalition as a “game changer” compared to the fragmented support of the past.
He said the group’s vote target had been raised from an initial eight million to over 20 million following the expansion of its structures nationwide, and reaffirmed support for the administration’s shift to Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) as an alternative to petrol-powered transport, which he said was opening new economic opportunities despite the difficulties posed by the removal of fuel subsidy.
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