By Rayyanu Bala

Governor Abdullahi Sule’s recent reflection on the outcome of the Osun State governorship election deserves more attention, particularly because of the way some opposition elements in Nasarawa State are celebrating and speaking as though the Osun experience can simply be copied and pasted into Nasarawa State.
Speaking at the inauguration of the Security Advisory Committee at the Government House last Monday, Governor Sule identified some of the factors that worked against the APC in Osun, including the influence of Abuja politicians and, more importantly, the power of incumbency.
His point about incumbency is difficult to dismiss. As he put it, “The power of a sitting governor is not something you can joke around.”
That observation raises a simple but important question for those celebrating the Osun result in Nasarawa State: What exactly are they seeking to replicate?
In Osun, the election was won by the party of the sitting governor. That is a fundamental fact that should not be lost in the excitement surrounding the result. The victorious party had the enormous political advantage of incumbency at the state level.
So, can the same political equation be reproduced in Nasarawa when the party being celebrated as the model is not the ruling party in Nasarawa State? The ruling party in Nasarawa State is the APC.
This is where political analysis must replace political wishful thinking. To think that any political party outside the APC could win an election in Nasarawa State is, at this stage, nothing more than wishful thinking.
Elections are not won simply because something happened in another state. Every election has its own political arithmetic. The strength of the candidates, the structure of the political parties, the popularity of the government in power, internal party cohesion, grassroots organisation, campaign strategy and, yes, the advantages that come with incumbency.
There is also a tendency in Nigerian politics to treat every electoral upset as a template waiting to be replicated elsewhere. But elections do not work like mathematical formulas. What produces victory in one state may produce an entirely different outcome in another.
If opposition politicians in Nasarawa believe the Osun result has given them a reason to celebrate, that is perfectly understandable. Politics thrives on optimism. But optimism should not be confused with certainty.
The more relevant question is whether the political conditions that produced the Osun outcome actually exist in Nasarawa State.
And this is precisely where Governor Sule’s warning about incumbency becomes significant. A sitting governor has visibility, political structure, government machinery, established relationships across the state and a record of achievements upon which voters can make their judgment. Anyone seeking to defeat an incumbent must therefore do more than point to what happened elsewhere. They must build a compelling local argument for why voters should change the status quo.
There is another lesson here. The APC’s loss in Osun should not be interpreted as evidence that incumbency is irrelevant. On the contrary, the fact that Governor Sule specifically drew attention to the power of incumbency suggests that political parties must understand both its strengths and its limitations.
The same applies to the opposition in Nasarawa State.
If they genuinely want to replicate Osun, they must first answer the obvious questions: What is the Nasarawa equivalent of the political circumstances that produced the Osun result? Who are the candidates? What is the strength of their party structures? Are they united? What is their grassroots presence? What is the mood of Nasarawa voters? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the incumbent administration? And, perhaps most importantly, can they convince voters that they have something better than what is currently on the table?
These are the questions that will determine the election, not what happened in another state.
Therefore, those already celebrating in Nasarawa State on the strength of what happened in Osun may need to take a breath. Osun is Osun. Nasarawa is Nasarawa. The two states have different political histories, different actors, different structures and different electoral dynamics.
There is nothing wrong with drawing lessons from another election. Indeed, every serious candidate should do so. But drawing lessons are different from assuming that history will automatically repeat itself.
The election is not about wishful thinking, as I said earlier. Therefore, it is not enough to say, “It happened in Osun, therefore it will happen in Nasarawa.” Politics does not operate on that kind of certainty.
The real test will come when the votes are cast and counted in Nasarawa State.
Until then, everyone is entitled to hope, strategise and campaigns. However, we must remember that the sitting governor of Nasarawa State is Engr. Abdullahi Alhaji Sule of the APC, and any attempt to predict the outcome of the 2027 election in Nasarawa state must take that political reality into account.