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When the capital dried up and the team had to shrink, most founders would have folded. Engr. Mustapha Ibrahim saw a different path-one that would transform a struggling delivery startup into a continental mobility vision.

In the brutal arithmetic of startup survival, there are moments that define a founder. For Engr. Mustapha Ibrahim, that moment arrived when the numbers stopped working. RoadRunner, the mobility technology venture he launched in 2022 with a sweeping vision of e-hailing, parcel delivery, and electric mobility, had run into the starkest wall in entrepreneurship: insufficient capital to sustain the pace of its ambition.

The pressure was unrelenting. The business could no longer carry the weight of a workforce sized for a future that had not yet arrived. Ibrahim faced the decision that has broken lesser entrepreneurs-the choice between preserving the dream and preserving the people who had believed in it.

He chose to preserve the dream.

‘I made the decision to preserve the core technology and continue developing the business around partnerships, strategic relationships and a more infrastructure-focused model,’ Ibrahim said in written responses about his entrepreneurial journey. It was a decision that required not just strategic clarity but a rare form of intellectual humility-the willingness to shrink in order to survive.

For the entrepreneur known publicly as the Ajebo Hustler-a moniker that captures both his street-smart origins and his relentless drive-that period became a crucible. It tested not what he wanted to build, but what he was willing to sacrifice to keep building.

A Vision Born from a Missed Delivery

To understand why Ibrahim refused to let RoadRunner die, one must understand its origins. The venture was born in 2019 from a moment of frustration that revealed a systemic failure. A missed delivery-a simple, everyday annoyance-sparked a vision of a continent where goods, services, and people move with reliability and efficiency.

What began as a courier service evolved into something far more ambitious: a platform designed to become the operating system for African mobility. The vision encompassed e-hailing, ride-sharing, parcel delivery, and commuting. But Ibrahim’s longer-term ambition stretched further-into electric mobility and financing structures that would allow drivers and mobility entrepreneurs to own their vehicles and build productive assets.

This was not a small dream. It was the kind of vision that requires patient capital, deep operational infrastructure, and the willingness to lose money today to build something transformative tomorrow. In the Nigerian startup ecosystem, such capital is scarce, and its scarcity has killed countless promising ventures.

RoadRunner nearly became another statistic. The funding gap meant the company could not sustain the customer acquisition costs, the talent, and the operational infrastructure required to build at the pace its vision demanded. The team had to shrink.

But Ibrahim made a strategic choice that would prove pivotal: he refused to let the technology die.

A Pivot Toward Infrastructure

As the team downsized, Ibrahim refocused RoadRunner’s strategy on what he believed would be the foundation of African mobility’s future: electric vehicles and the infrastructure to support them.

He traveled to China, engaging directly with manufacturers, including a visit to Yadea in Wuxi. The goal was not simply to import vehicles but to understand the ecosystem-the charging networks, the battery-swapping infrastructure, the financing models-that would make electric mobility viable in African cities.

‘I have learned to adapt without abandoning the bigger picture,’ Ibrahim said.

This pivot was not a retreat. It was a strategic re-architecture. Ibrahim was repositioning RoadRunner from a consumer-facing delivery app to an infrastructure and partnership-driven platform. The new model would connect electric vehicles, charging infrastructure, and financing for drivers-creating a vertically integrated ecosystem rather than a standalone service.

It was the kind of move that echoes the strategic pivots of history’s greatest entrepreneurs. When Steve Jobs was forced out of Apple in 1985, he founded NeXT and acquired Pixar-experiences that would transform him and, eventually, allow him to return and save Apple from irrelevance. When Elon Musk faced the near-death of Tesla and SpaceX in 2008, he poured his remaining fortune into both companies, betting everything on his conviction.

Ibrahim made a similar bet. He bet on the vision, not the moment.

The Lesson in the Struggle

The RoadRunner story is not yet a triumphant narrative of market dominance. It is something more instructive: a story of what it takes to survive the middle stage-the period after the idea has become a business but before the resources have arrived to scale it.

Across Ibrahim’s business interests, including PIVEA Group, whose activities span real estate, construction, and investment management, he describes a recurring tension between the scale of an opportunity and the resources available to pursue it.

The RoadRunner experience taught him to value patience over speed, and restructuring over rigidity.

Progress, he learned, sometimes means narrowing the immediate operation while retaining the longer-term purpose.

‘My journey has taught me that vision is important, but resilience is what gives vision a chance to become reality,

‘ he said.

The Ajebo Hustler’s Philosophy

The name ‘Ajebo Hustler’ is not an accident. In Nigerian parlance, ‘Ajebo’ refers to someone from a privileged background, while ‘Hustler’ signifies the grind, the relentless pursuit of opportunity. Ibrahim embodies both: the strategic sophistication of someone who has studied at the University of Leeds and the University of Wollongong in Dubai, and the street-level tenacity of someone who understands that vision without execution is fantasy.

His story offers a counter-narrative to the mythology of the overnight success. It is a reminder that the entrepreneurs we celebrate-the Musks, the Jobs, the Rockefellers-are not defined by their victories but by their refusal to accept defeat when the odds were insurmountable.

Ibrahim’s account offers a view of entrepreneurship during a difficult middle stage: after an idea has become a business, while the resources needed for its wider ambitions are still being assembled.

It is a story of what it means to keep the light on when the fuel runs low. And it is a story that is far from over.

The Borno State Police Command has arrested and arraigned five men in Maiduguri for allegedly printing and wearing T-shirts bearing the inscription ‘Tinubu Must Go.’

According to a First Information Report (FIR) issued by the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) and verified through court officials, the suspects are Baba Aji Gremami (44), Mustapha Abba Yemen (28), Abbacha Mohammed Ali (32), Adam Umar Gubio (21), and Abdulhamid Mohammed (21).

The document, dated September 29, 2026, states that the incident occurred on September 25 at around 11:00 a.m. around the West End Roundabout community in the Borno State capital.

The police charged the defendants with criminal conspiracy, inciting disturbance, disturbance of public peace, and thuggery-offences the prosecution argues run contrary to Sections 60, 78, 79, and 392 of the Borno State Penal Code.

When the case was brought before the Chief Magistrate Court I in Maiduguri, all five defendants pleaded not guilty. Their legal counsel subsequently moved a bail application.

The presiding judge adjourned the matter to October 6, 2026, for a ruling on bail, while the substantive trial has been slated for October 26, 2026.

In a strongly worded statement, Amnesty International (AI) slammed the charges against the men as bizarre, labeling their detention as an act of arbitrary arrest.

The organization emphasized that expressing peaceful political dissent through clothing is a fundamental human right, not a criminal offense.

The Kano State Government has approved a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement for the development of the Kano Energy and SME Industrial Park at the AKK Industrial Layout, Tamburawa, where the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) pipeline terminal is located.

Kano State Commissioner for Information and Internal Affairs, Ibrahim Wayya, disclosed this after the 41st Executive Council meeting held last Thursday in Abuja.

Wayya said the initiative was designed to create an enabling environment for energy-related businesses and small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) to maximise the benefits of the AKK pipeline project.

The commissioner also said the council approved the acquisition of properties for overriding public interest, including Saymays Specialist Hospital, Gandun Albasa, and another private property near the Infectious Diseases Hospital (IDH) and Abubakar Imam Urology Centre on France Road.

He said the council approved a total of N144.006 billion for various projects. Of the amount, N84.9 billion was allocated to the Ministry of Works for road construction and additional works on the ongoing rehabilitation of the RMK Flyover-Obasanjo Flyover-IBB Road-Mazugal Junction-Katsina Road corridor.

The council also approved ?8.88 billion for the reconstruction and dualisation of Hajj Camp Road.

According to Wayya, N435 million was approved for the procurement of operational vehicles for the state Hisbah Board under the Office of the Secretary to the State Government.

The commissioner further announced the council’s approval for the 2026 Kano Art and Cultural Festival (KANFEST), describing the event as an important platform for promoting the state’s cultural heritage, creative industries, tourism and local talent.

He added that, following the poor condition of the Eastern Bypass-Tsamiya Babba-Larabawar Abasawa-Nera Roundabout section of Ringim Road, the council directed the Ministry of Works to submit a detailed Bill of Engineering Measurement and Evaluation (BEME) for consideration.

Wayya said the decisions reflected the state government’s commitment to addressing infrastructure and development needs across Kano.

The village head of Aujarawar Alkali in Gezawa Local Government Area of Kano State, Alhaji Ahmad Yakubu Ahmad, has reportedly been killed by his abductors.

Ahmad was abducted on Tuesday, September 17, 2026, when gunmen stormed the community in the night.

His body was reportedly recovered after his abductors killed him.

Funeral prayers were conducted at 3pm on Wednesday, after which he was buried. Musa Garba, a resident of Gezawa, confirmed the development to our reporter in a telephone interview.

According to him, the assailants tortured the village head to death by cutting off one of his legs and tying his hands.

Garba said that the abductors later buried the remains of the village head in a shallow grave in a village called Danladin Gezawa.

He said, ‘I attend the funeral prayers today (Wednesday) at around 3pm. The assailants tortured the village head to death by cutting off one of his legs and tying his hand behind him. He was brutalized until he died.

‘After his death, the abductors buried his remains in a shallow grave in a village called Danladin Gezawa. Four days later, some village discovered the grave and raised the alarm.

‘The remains were identified by the deceased’s wife. He was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead and later buried by the hospital officials because the remains were already decomposing.’

Police are yet to issue a formal statement regarding the incident.

Imo State Governor, Hope Uzodimma says he is expanding a grassroots media campaign to secure President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s re-election in 2027.

Speaking on Tuesday in Abuja, RHA Director of Logistics, Shehu Bala Usman, disclosed that the group is launching a public enlightenment campaign, including weekly television broadcasts scheduled to air in the coming days.

‘It’s an effective use of digital and new media platforms to enlighten the general public on the Federal Government’s policies, counter misinformation, and connect the administration’s reform narrative with voters at the grassroots,’ Usman said.

The media strategy comes on the heels of calls by a coalition of legal practitioners urging Wike to cease personal attacks on the Imo governor, warning that the feud risks creating conflicts of interest and disrupting the coordination of President Tinubu’s campaign.

Usman noted that the initiative represents a broader strategy by Governor Uzodimma to deploy modern media as a primary engine for political engagement ahead of the 2027 general elections.

Addressing a national mobilization retreat in Abuja earlier this year, Uzodimma warned that poor communication leaves government policy open to distortion and misrepresentation.

He urged party supporters to bridge the gap by taking the administration’s achievements directly to citizens.

A lawyer in Kano, Hamisu Dandago, has been arraigned before a Kano court over alleged forgery and dissemination of false information.

Dandago, who denied the allegations, was accused of preparing a document in the name of a company and presenting it before the court in an attempt to withdraw a case.

According to the charge, the defendant allegedly forged the document and used it in connection with the court proceedings.

His counsel, Barrister Danjuma Hussaini, applied for his bail, while the prosecution counsel, Barrister A’isha Bashir Minjibir, did not oppose the application.

Ruling on the application, Magistrate Haulatu Magaji Kankarofi granted the defendant bail, with a condition that his sureties would forfeit N500,000 each if he jumped bail.

A prominent Kano cleric, Sheikh Ibrahim Khalil, has asked a Federal High Court to compel the African Democratic Congress (ADC) to remove the name of Ibrahim Ali Amin popularly called Little which was submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC as the party’s Kano State governorship candidate for the 2027 elections and be substituted with his name.

Khalil who is also the chairman of Kano State Council of Ulama aspired to be the ADC flag bearer in the election. ADC under Musa Ungogo as the party chairman had declared Khalil winner of the party primary, but after dissolution of the state executives of the party, ADC submitted the name of Ibrahim Ali Little, a close political associate of Atiku Abubakar, the party presidential candidate instead.

Counsel for Sheikh Khalil, AA Abubakar, told the court that all the defendants in the case have been duly served with the court processes. Counsel for Amin Little who is the second defendant in the case equally told the court that they were served as claimed.

Governor Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State has urged politicians and citizens to play politics with respect and without bitterness as the 2027 general elections approach.

Sule made the call on Tuesday in Lafia during his address at the Nasarawa Carnival organized to mark the 30th anniversary of the creation of the state.

‘Elections are coming very soon. I know we cannot all be on the same page, but let us disagree with respect. Let us play democracy the way it’s supposed to be,’ the governor said.

‘Power comes only from God Almighty. No matter how we love anyone that we want for the power, it’s only God Almighty that gives that power.’

He urged the people not to listen to anyone interested in causing disagreement among them for political reasons.

‘Do not listen to anyone who is interested in causing disagreement between us when it comes to politics. We can disagree to agree, and we can agree to disagree. It is not a matter of life and death,’ he stated.

He commended President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for his economic reforms, which he said are making it possible for states to generate their own electricity, generate more revenue and provide their own security.

The governor warned that political crisis and lack of peace will scare investors away from the state, which he said is currently attracting investors in solid minerals, including the largest lithium processing plant in Africa.

I sometimes wonder if Schattschneider would review his opinion on the centrality of political parties in a democratic dispensation if he had anticipated the situation in Nigeria today. In 2022, I was invited to serve as Senior Special Adviser on Policy and Strategy to the then National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress. In that capacity, I had the privilege of observing the party from close quarters as we prepared for and conducted the 2023 general elections, from which its presidential candidate emerged victorious.

Looking back to that period and at Nigeria’s political terrain today as we approach another general election, I sometimes find it difficult to recognise the APC as I knew it then. The same uncertainty applies, perhaps even more profoundly, to the various opposition parties and their viability as coherent political organisations. Perhaps Nigeria is gradually introducing another form of democracy to the world: democracy in which political parties exist everywhere in law and symbolism, but increasingly absent as meaningful institutions of political mobilisation.

To all intents and purposes, the 2027 elections may be conducted without the centrality of political parties as the bedrock of the democratic order. This may sound contradictory because Nigeria remains constitutionally a party-based democracy. Candidates must be sponsored by political parties, primaries provide the recognised means of nomination, party symbols will appear on ballot papers and party agents will populate polling units. INEC’s timetable itself places parties at the centre of candidate nomination and electoral participation.

There is however, an important distinction between the legal existence of parties and their political relevance as institutions of electoral democracy. What appears to be emerging is not literally an election without political parties, but an electoral contest in which party identity is being overshadowed by personalities, governors, ministers, political financiers, religious influencers, regional calculations, incumbency and informal coalitions assembled principally to capture electoral advantage.

Political parties ordinarily perform these indispensable democratic functions. They aggregate interests, formulate policies, recruit leaders, produce manifestos, educate voters and present identifiable alternatives. A party is supposed to represent something recognisable and reasonably enduring beyond the ambition of the individual seeking office under its banner. When those distinctions disappear, parties become little more than vehicles of noisemaking and convenience.

Nigeria has been travelling in this direction for some time. Politicians move remarkably easily from one party to another, frequently without any corresponding alteration in philosophy, policy or worldview. Yesterday’s adversary becomes today’s indispensable ally. A politician who previously condemned a party as incapable of governing may subsequently join it and become one of its loudest defenders. Another occupying a commanding position in government may move to the opposition and immediately embrace propositions he previously opposed.

One is therefore compelled to ask if political convictions can be transferred so effortlessly from one platform to another, what exactly do the parties stand for. The approach to 2027 makes this question especially important because neither the opposition nor the governing party appears completely settled within the traditional logic of party organisation.

The opposition coalition appears uncertain in its composition, leadership, programme and capacity to reconcile competing personal ambitions. The basic proposition behind opposition cooperation is understandable. Disparate political forces may legitimately seek common ground against an incumbent government. Coalition politics occurs in democracies everywhere. The difficulty begins when personalities precede or supersede programmes.

Where a coalition rests upon shared ideas and an agreed programme of government, the identity of its eventual candidate, however important, should remain subordinate to the larger political project. Where conversely personal ambitions and calculations of electoral advantage dominate, coalition-building becomes less about constructing an alternative government than about reconciling individual aspirations. The opposition can therefore find itself in the curious position of having many politicians interested in coalition-building without necessarily possessing a coherent coalition platform.

But the governing APC seems to be confronting its own version of precisely the same problem. The controversy surrounding the so-called Rainbow Coalition associated with FCT Minister Nyesom Wike illustrates this phenomenon vividly. Wike has stated that the coalition is mobilising for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s re-election rather than for the APC as an organisation. APC governors, conversely, have declared that they will not support arrangements capable of weakening their party or adversely affecting its candidates at other levels.

Whatever position one takes on that curious disagreement, its significance extends far beyond the personalities involved. It raises a fundamental question about the meaning of party loyalty itself. Ordinarily, support for the presidential candidate of a political party should form part of a broader commitment to that party’s fortunes. But Nigeria now appears capable of producing arrangements whereby individuals support the presidential candidate of one party while backing governorship or legislative candidates belonging to another.

Where, then, are party affiliation, loyalty and supremacy? This is perhaps the central paradox of 2027. The opposition is searching for a coalition capable of transcending its constituent political parties, while the governing side is confronted by a coalition that could itself transcend the ruling party. On one side stands an opposition attempting to construct cooperation beyond existing party boundaries. On the other stands an incumbent President attracting support from politicians whose commitment to his candidacy does not necessarily extend to the entire APC platform that brought him into office in the first place.

Between them stands an electorate confronted increasingly not simply by parties, but by personalities, alliances, governors, ministers, religious leaders, praise singers, financiers, regional arrangements and competing political structures. The word ‘structure’ has indeed become extraordinarily revealing in Nigerian politics. Discussion increasingly centres on who controls the structure in a state, who commands local government machinery, who influences delegates, who controls campaign financing, who can mobilise crowds and voters, and who possesses access to the institutional levers capable of shaping electoral outcomes.

Far less attention is devoted to what the political parties actually believe. Therein lies the danger. Strong democracies require strong political parties. Parties should not merely nominate candidates, print posters, organise rallies and disappear until the next election. They should be repositories of ideas capable of surviving individual leaders. Presidents should leave office without parties losing their identities. Governors should come and go while institutions endure. Internal democracy should allow members to influence policy and candidate selection rather than reducing entire parties to extensions of powerful personalities.

Nigeria once possessed parties with more discernible identities and characters. During the First Republic, the Northern People’s Congress, Action Group, National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons and United Middle Belt Congress possessed identifiable constituencies, leadership traditions and political orientations. During the Second Republic, parties such as the NPN, UPN, NPP, PRP and GNPP similarly offered clearer political identities. The NRC and SDP of the aborted Third Republic represented another experiment in structured party competition.

These arrangements should not be romanticised. Many were heavily regionalised, while ethnic and sectional divisions contributed to political instability. Nevertheless, voters could often associate parties with recognisable leadership, traditions, constituencies and programmes. Today, differentiation has become considerably more difficult. Defections reinforce this tendency. A politician may pass through several major parties while retaining substantially the same political worldview throughout. Perhaps the explanation is that his philosophy never belonged to any of those parties in the first place.

This has consequences for democratic accountability. In a functioning party system, voters can reward or punish a party for its record. Institutional memory develops. Manifestos acquire meaning because parties are expected to defend recognisable principles over time. But accountability becomes blurred when politicians repeatedly cross party boundaries or openly work for candidates outside their own platforms. What exactly is the voter endorsing: the politician, the party, the manifesto, or merely the temporary coalition prevailing during that election?

The personalisation of politics is particularly consequential in a presidential system. Presidential contests naturally concentrate attention upon individuals. Television, social media, rallies and personality-driven campaigning intensify that tendency until politics becomes increasingly presidentialised while parties themselves recede into the background. The danger, therefore, is not that political parties will literally disappear in 2027. They cannot easily do so because Nigerian electoral law continues to place them at the centre of nominations and candidate sponsorship.

The danger is subtler. Nigeria could arrive at an election in which political parties remain legally indispensable while becoming politically secondary. There will be party logos on ballot papers, flags at rallies, primaries, agents, offices, slogans and manifestos. But behind these formalities may stand political formations assembled primarily around individuals: temporary alliances of governors, financiers, religious vendors, regional brokers, political entrepreneurs and influential personalities negotiating across party boundaries.

This is why the expression ‘election without political parties’ deserves consideration. The opposition appears to be struggling to build something larger than its constituent parties. The governing party, meanwhile, appears concerned that support for its presidential candidate could become detached from loyalty to the APC itself. Both tendencies point towards the same phenomenon: the fragmentation and weakening of the political party as the principal organising institution of democratic competition.

The decisive question approaching 2027 may therefore not simply be which party Nigerians will vote for. It may increasingly become whether Nigerians are voting for political parties at all. If personalities and temporary coalitions become the actual instruments of electoral mobilisation while parties merely provide the legal platforms upon which candidates’ names appear, Nigeria may enter 2027 with numerous political parties but considerably less genuine party politics. That would indeed be, in political rather than constitutional terms, an election without political parties.

The rift between former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir Lawal, and the Adamawa State governorship candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), Senator Aishatu Dahiru Ahmed Binani, has continued to deepen.

Pundits say this exposes a wider struggle over the control and direction of the opposition party in the North-East ahead of the 2027 elections.

The dispute followed Lawal’s appointment by the NDC national leadership to play a leadership role in the North-East and North-Central zones shortly after joining the party.

Six NDC governorship candidates in the North-East subsequently rejected the appointment, saying they were not consulted and would not recognise Lawal as the party’s leader in the region.

The development has placed the NDC’s national leadership on one side and some of its state-level political actors on the other, raising questions about how the relatively new opposition platform will reconcile national political realignment with politicians who say they have invested in building its structures at the grassroots.

Lawal’s entry into the NDC itself followed his resignation from the African Democratic Congress (ADC) in June. He had accused the ADC of manipulating its presidential primary in favour of former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, a claim disputed by the party. He joined the NDC in September and declared support for the Peter Obi-Rabiu Kwankwaso presidential ticket.

Receiving him into the NDC, the party’s National Leader, Senator Seriake Dickson, described Lawal as a political mobiliser and said he would play a leadership role in the North-East and help provide guidance to candidates and campaigns in the region.

But the appointment immediately exposed a fault line within the party.

The six governorship candidates from Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Taraba and Yobe said the national leadership should have consulted them and other stakeholders before appointing Lawal. They maintained that their position was ‘collective, firm and final’ and that they would not recognise him as North-East leader.

Lawal responded forcefully alleging that the protest was being organised by a ‘female pretender to the governorship candidacy of Adamawa State.’

He also said two of the candidates whose names appeared on the protest statement had contacted him to distance themselves from it.

‘Professor Mohammed Sani Yahaya and Dr Babayo Ardo of Taraba and Gombe States respectively, have reached out to me to dissociate themselves from this press release and even implied that their names and signatures on the document were inserted without their authority and knowledge,’ Lawal said.

Lawal also insisted that he did not lobby for the position, saying the appointment was made by the national leadership.

He went further to allege that some of those opposed to him were working against the NDC presidential ticket, Peter Obi, from within the party.

‘I know that my joining the NDC at this stage poses a major threat to those working for Atiku from within the NDC as subversives of the Peter/Kwankwaso ticket,’ Lawal alleged.

Lawal claimed that during a visit to the state between August 25 and September 10, he saw little evidence of NDC activity across the state.

The Binani campaign organisation however rejected the allegations, accusing Lawal of trying to undermine politicians who built the NDC structure before his arrival.

In its response, the organisation described his statement as ‘highly erratic, abusive, and self-serving’ and rejected the attempt to portray Binani and the other governorship candidates as agents of outside political interests.

‘The attempt by BD to brand Senator Aisha (Binani) and the other five gubernatorial candidates as ‘moles’ for external interests is a cheap, desperate, and outdated blackmail tactic,’ the organisation said.

The Binani camp also challenged Lawal’s claim that there was little NDC activity in Adamawa, pointing to his own allegation that Binani had funded nomination and expression-of-interest forms for several legislative candidates in the state.

A political analyst in Adamawa, Dr Mahdi Abba, however, took a more critical view of Lawal’s political relevance.

Abba said the rejection of Lawal by politicians within the NDC should serve as a warning to the party ahead of the 2027 elections.

For the NDC, the Babachir-Binani confrontation is becoming a test of how the party manages powerful personalities, existing candidates and competing political interests under one platform.

Whether the national leadership can resolve the disagreement without deepening divisions in the North-East may determine whether Lawal’s entry becomes an asset for the party’s regional organisation or another source of internal friction as the 2027 elections approach.