The Director-General of the Renewed Hope Ambassadors and Chairman of the Progressive Governors’ Forum, Hope Uzodimma, on Wednesday said the party had recruited 4,421,150 persons across the nation’s 176,846 polling units as part of its mobilisation plan ahead of the 2027 elections.
He expressed confidence that President Bola Tinubu’s performance in office would earn him a second term in the 2027 general election.
Uzodimma, who is also the Governor of Imo State, made the disclosure in his keynote address at the two-day Renewed Hope Ambassadors national retreat held at the Transcorp Hilton, Abuja.
He said the retreat was meant to build a unified grassroots mobilisation machinery ahead of the 2027 general elections.
“At 25 canvassers to a polling unit, that is a lawful civic force of 4,421,150 people across the federation.
“That is the mathematics of serious mobilisation. That is the difference between hoping to win and organising to win,” he declared.
The governor further outlined what he described as a layered command structure running from a national coordinating centre through six geopolitical zones, 36 states and the FCT, 774 local government areas, 8,809 registration areas and wards, and down to each of the 176,846 polling units.
According to him, the RHA now operates across 17 directorates covering youth, organisation and mobilisation, media and publicity, digital and new media, finance, monitoring, compliance and legal, technology and data, support groups, intelligence, special duties, planning, welfare, administration, women affairs, diaspora, and research and innovation.
He also announced that the RHA had unveiled a digital platform in April, equipped with a data communication centre to track public sentiment and counter misinformation in real time.
Describing 2027 as a defining moment, Uzodimma declared that the elections would be “a referendum on a single question: does Nigeria stay on this hard but necessary road of reform, stability, and shared prosperity, or turn back?”
He told participants who are coordinators drawn from across the country’s six geopolitical zones that the retreat was not a ceremonial gathering but a working session that must produce a declaration on national mobilisation, a national grassroots mobilisation blueprint, a standard messaging manual, state-by-state action plans, a polling unit deployment doctrine, a monitoring and evaluation framework, and an election readiness checklist before dispersal.
“Do not waste it on speeches. Build something that lasts,” the governor urged, charging the delegates to operate as “the bridge between policy and the people at every ward, market and polling unit.”
He argued that silence, rather than failure, is the primary vulnerability of any government.
According to him, “Very often, it is silence. When we do good work and nobody hears the story, someone else tells it for us, and they tell it wrong. When reform goes unexplained, rumour rushes in to fill the gap.”
Defending key policies of the administration, including the removal of fuel subsidy and foreign exchange reforms, Uzodimma said the measures were difficult but necessary decisions aimed at securing Nigeria’s long-term economic future.
“The President chose the path of courage over convenience. Our responsibility is to explain these reforms to Nigerians and ensure that the benefits are clearly understood at the grassroots,” he stated.
The RHA Director-General pointed to recent economic indicators as evidence that the reforms were yielding results, noting that Nigeria recorded a 3.89 per cent Gross Domestic Product growth in the first quarter of 2026.
He also highlighted major infrastructure projects being undertaken by the Federal Government, including the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway, Sokoto-Badagry Road, Abuja-Kaduna-Zaria-Kano Road, Enugu-Onitsha Expressway and Bodo-Bonny Road.
Uzodinma further cited improvements in healthcare, the student loan scheme, consumer credit programme, implementation of the new minimum wage, tax reforms and the Presidential Compressed Natural Gas Initiative as indicators of progress under the current administration.
In his welcome address, the APC National Chairman, Prof Nentawe Yilwatda, said the Tinubu administration had recorded notable economic gains, citing what he described as tangible outcomes of the government’s reform programme over the last three years.
He disclosed that Nigeria’s foreign reserves had risen to over $50bn, that the country recorded a trade surplus of N7.55tn in the first quarter of 2026, and that Shell, which he said had been reducing investment in Nigeria, had committed a fresh $20bn to the Nigerian economy.
“Investors who once sat on the sidelines are now taking a fresh look at Nigeria.
“Shell that was pulling investment is committing a fresh $20bn into our economy,” Yilwatda said.
He also noted that major credit rating agencies had upgraded Nigeria’s sovereign ratings, citing improvements in external balances, foreign exchange management, fiscal performance and investor confidence, while states and local governments were receiving increased allocations as a result of expanded government revenues.
The chairman challenged the Renewed Hope Ambassadors to translate the administration’s economic data into accessible human narratives.
He said, “Policies do not speak for themselves. Projects do not speak for themselves. Statistics do not speak for themselves. People speak.
“When discussing student loans, tell the story of a young Nigerian whose future has been transformed through access to education.
“When discussing health insurance and cancer centres, tell the story of families gaining access to quality healthcare. Data informs minds, but stories inspire hearts.”
Yilwatda also cited the economic growth data in Uzodimma’s keynote, which noted that real GDP grew by 3.89 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2026, up from 3.13 per cent the year before, with the non-oil sector contributing 96.08 per cent of the growth, figures drawn from the National Bureau of Statistics.
On infrastructure, the APC chairman highlighted the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway, the Sokoto-Badagry Super Highway, which he said was designed with over 300 dams for agriculture, energy and water distribution, and the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano Gas Pipeline as flagship projects of the administration’s development agenda.
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