By Umogbai E. Augustine
17th November 2025
Distinguished Senator David Mark,
Former President of the Senate, Federal Republic of Nigeria,
Chairman and Moral Compass, African Democratic Congress (ADC)
Sir,
I rise to address this letter with profound gratitude, deep seated respect, and an urgent sense of national duty. My heart compels these words because the moment demands clarity, courage, and truth.
First, permit me to extend my sincerest appreciation for your exceptional sacrifice in accepting to steer the African Democratic Congress at a time when many had withdrawn in despair, and when the party itself stood at the brink of institutional orphanhood. Your decision to step forward when silence would have been easier is one of the most defining acts of statesmanship Nigeria has witnessed in the last six years. With characteristic humility, you restored direction, dignity, and hope to a platform that had all but lost its compass.
Under your steady and visionary guidance, the ADC has not merely survived; it has begun to breathe again, to dream again, and to reclaim its rightful place as a vessel of national renewal. For this singular rebirth, the youths of this country, the forgotten masses, and every compatriot who still believes in the Nigeria project owe you an immense debt of gratitude. We say, with unity of voice and sincerity of heart: *THANK YOU, SIR.*
Time and again, you have graced the national stage with a calm but authoritative voice one that compels attention, trust, and reflection. You have travelled across the length and breadth of this country, sitting with ordinary citizens, hearing their cries, and offering hope where despair had taken root. What you have demonstrated is not the routine theatre of politics; it is leadership in its purest form the kind Nigeria has hungered for, yet scarcely received.
I recall with pride and admiration the 6th and 7th Senate under your presidency. Never before or since has the National Assembly enjoyed such stability, credibility, and output. You tamed the storms, quietened the tempests, and upheld the Senate as a genuine House of Honour. Not once was your leadership shaken by impeachment plots, theatrical confrontations, or institutional chaos. You proved, with incomparable grace, that true leadership is not in noise, but in wisdom, restraint, and statesmanship.
*Yet, there is a moment that history will forever preserve in gold, when President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua of blessed memory took ill and the nation drifted dangerously toward a constitutional abyss, you stood firm. While power blocs schemed and the constitution strained under the weight of personal interests, you rose calmly, courageously, and constitutionally to invoke the Doctrine of Necessity. With that singular act, you rescued the nation from catastrophic uncertainty. You transferred power peacefully to Dr. Goodluck Jonathan without bloodshed, without acrimony, and without tearing the fragile national fabric*
On that day, Sir, you were God’s answer to a nation on its knees.
Today, Nigeria is kneeling once again pleading for salvation.
I watched the recently concluded PDP national convention with a heavy and sorrowful heart. What unfolded was not a democratic convention but a coronation of despair. A once great political institution has reduced itself to a marketplace where principles are priced, loyalty auctioned, and the voices of young people silenced by the arrogance of political monopolists. The belated expulsion of the *untouchables* is now an afterthought. The party has imploded into factions, favoritism, and bitterness. The PDP has tragically completed its descent from a people’s party to a private estate. It is finished.
And in this era of national mourning for the collapse of credible opposition, history once again turns its gaze upon you, Distinguished Senator.
*Distinguish Senator David Mark,* you remain a divine gift to this country. Nigeria needs you to rise once more *ONE MORE TIME.* You stand today as one of the few remaining statesmen with the moral authority, national acceptance, composure, wisdom, and God-fearing disposition to rebuild and reposition a credible opposition for the survival of our democracy.
The youths neglected, unemployed, brutalised, and disillusioned look to you. The masses struggling to afford a single meal look to you. The middle class, now vanishing under economic suffocation, look to you. Even patriotic members of the ruling APC who recognise the failures of the system but fear to speak look to you.
You are among the very few who can speak truth to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu without fear or favour. You are among the very few whose voice resonates across the North, South, East, and West without suspicion. You are uniquely placed to assemble Nigeria’s finest minds across party divides and craft a national rescue blueprint for 2027. Yours is the voice that both the uniformed and civilian establishments still heed with respect.
Under your guidance, the ADC has evolved beyond a political party; it has become Nigeria’s last reservoir of ideological clarity, youth inclusion, and national cohesion. This new flame must not be allowed to flicker or die.
Sir, the messiah Nigeria awaits in 2027 may not necessarily be you though should you choose to rise to that call, heaven and earth would rally in your favour. The messiah may well be that young, patriotic, brilliant, and detribalised Nigerian whom you will identify, mentor, and present to the nation through a revitalised, restructured, and genuinely democratic ADC. But that vessel must be built now. The labour must begin now. Time is no longer on our side. *NIGERIA IS BLEEDING*
Umogbai E Augustine is public Affairs Analyst.
