Security and intelligence analyst Dr. Sani Aliyu has weighed in on Nigeria’s long-standing zoning debate, describing the circumstances that brought former President Goodluck Jonathan to power as exceptional rather than deliberate political calculation.
Speaking during an interview on Trust TV on May 12, 2026, Aliyu addressed lingering sentiments around the power shift that followed the death of former President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, particularly claims that the North was shortchanged in the country’s informal power rotation arrangement.
During the interview, he said, “After he took the chance of the north in 2011. There is no president in the south that has died that you will say the north will have to revenge. That has happened. We should allow that to go. It was a circumstantial situation.” His remarks suggest that the political developments of that period should not be viewed through the lens of retaliation or entitlement.
Aliyu explained that Jonathan’s emergence as president in 2010, following Yar’Adua’s passing, was guided by constitutional provisions rather than political maneuvering. He noted that while the zoning principle within parties like the People’s Democratic Party aimed to ensure regional balance, unforeseen events disrupted its application at the time…See More
