Editorial
Obasanjo vs Tinubu: Between eczema and cancer
Nigerians for the better part of last week, were treated to another round of entertainment, though of the usual macabre hue. On stage were Olusegun Obasanjo, Nigeria’s longest serving leader in history – three years as military Head of State and eight years as civilian President and the incumbent, Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
The curtain opened with the former President stepping out to play the character with which he has established himself in the consciousness of Nigeria for decades now, whether in or out of office. He spoke out again, when everyone else was silent. The former President, kept a date as he mounted the rostrum to tell the entire world the story of today’s Nigeria.
As the Guest Speaker at the Chinua Achebe Leadership Forum, Yale University New Haven, Connecticut, USA, on Saturday, November 15, 2024, Obasanjo once again, broke the somewhat unwritten law within the corps of the National Council of State, where leaders of Nigeria either in military or civilian garbs hold court and where official reticence and silence to state matters, have always been maintained as tradition.
Historically, Obasanjo has always been the deviant in keeping to this tradition, which in the main, is explained away as a way of not distracting the incumbent since they individually have direct channels of communication to offer their advice, but one reason, all the same which mostly fail to resonate with the people, especially in moments of extreme situations such as Nigeria is experiencing now.
So, speaking on the topic: Leadership Failure and State Capture in Nigeria, Obasanjo put a knife directly in the centre of the boil and delivered the message to what millions of Nigerians had known and been talking about for many months – the country is in dire straits – Nigeria is crumbling – Nigeria is failing! That message, obviously was for the global audience, because virtually everyone living in Nigeria at the moment can connect with it.
Of course, the culprit, the former President pointed to were Muhammadu Buhari, his mimic as both former military Head of State and civilian President, who left power to Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in 2023. Both Buhari and Tinubu have run a relay of running the country on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) since 2015.
This period – 10 years short of few months, since May 29, 2015, Obasanjo summed up as disaster in his treatise before the world. With the systematic bastardisation of the polity through poor election, supervised by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and a massively corrupt judiciary, he was unequivocal that Nigeria as a county had been firmly and officially captured by the two.
Regretting that the two had shown complete lack of ideas and absence of zeal in putting things right for the county, but instead demonstrated the direct opposite, he was also unequivocal about the direction the country was headed under Buhari, whom he named as Baba Go Slow and Tinubu, with the sobriquet – Emilokan – was determined – complete doom!
Hear him: “As we can see and understand, Nigeria’s situation is bad. The more the immorality and corruption of a nation, the more the nation sinks into chaos, insecurity, conflict, discord, division, disunity, depression, youth restiveness, confusion, violence, and underdevelopment.
“That’s the situation mostly in Nigeria in the reign of Baba-go-slow and Emilokan. The failing state status of Nigeria is confirmed and glaringly indicated and manifested for every honest person to see through the consequences of the level of our pervasive corruption, mediocrity, immorality, misconduct, mismanagement, perversion, injustice, incompetence and all other forms of iniquity.”
In a dig understood to describe Tinubu’s iron grip since he left as Governor of Lagos State in 2007 and which he is apparently replicating in Nigeria as President, Obasanjo told his audience: “My military training and experience taught me that what you capture, you tend to hold under your sole control for as long as you can hold it. That is the case of one governor of a state who still holds the state captive in his pocket 25 years after being the governor of the state.”
Of course Tinubu, who would not allow the heavy laceration slide has since fired back, though not directly as Obasanjo, but through his various spokesmen, with his conclusion being that Obasanjo lacked the moral suasion to deliver such preachments as he was far guiltier as a bad leader, given his records between 1999 and 2007 when he held sway.
Bayo Onanuga, presidential spokesman, in a statement conveyed Tinubu’s clapback thus: “Brazen illegality and assault on the Constitution of Nigeria reached a disturbing height under the leadership of Chief Obasanjo. During Obasanjo’s era, the unconstitutional impeachment of four governors who belonged to his party occurred.
“The governors impeached by minority members of the Houses of Assembly were Joshua Dariye of Plateau, Rashidi Ladoja of Oyo, Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti and Diepreye Alamieyeseigha of Bayelsa. A man under whose watch all of these egregious infractions occurred should certainly not be the one to give any lecture on leadership and corruption. He should not be taken seriously as he reeks of profound hypocrisy of the worst form.”
What is our position? We agree that both sides do not smell roses on all counts. Just as Tinubu observed, the Chinua Achebe Obasanjo copiously quoted as a model in his treatise during the US outing, rejected the highest national honours awarded to him, referencing the bad behaviours of the former President as his major reason.
Citing his hands in the massive acts of brigandage in Anambra State where he hailed, leading to the kidnap of Chris Ngige, then sitting governor and the burning of the assets under the nose of state agents, Achebe had told Obasanjo: “Nigeria’s condition today under your watch is…too dangerous for silence. I must register my disappointment and protest by declining to accept the high honour awarded me in the 2004 honours list.”
But in comparison to the Obasanjo era, Tinubu, as they say, is something else. At no time in the history of Nigeria has the country witnessed what is happening to it today. Many Nigerians have dubbed it official wickedness or more poignantly in the local parlance – shege banza. They say Tinubu is deliberately and intentionally supervising official blitzkrieg on Nigerians. We could not agree more or less. There is no other way to describe the situation.
What we cannot establish is why? Of course, the official explanation for the uncanny policies which were unleashed on the country even before the ink on which Tinubu signed his signature on the documents declaring him President dried up, is that he is reforming the Nigerian economy. But much as few people would disagree on such a need, the more compelling, groundswell position is that Tinubu’s is a government of self and deceit.
Adewole Adebayo, presidential candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), in the 2023 election seemed to have captured the meaning better when he told his host on Arise News Television that Tinubu’s government is one in which the officials see Nigerians as customers in a business transaction with the intention of milking them consistently for profit. This is one of the most fitting depictions.
Yes! Obasanjo may have represented the depiction Tinubu attempted to tag him with and even more. But even his worst outing pales into insignificance in comparison. In terms of magnitude of impact, it is like comparing eczema to cancer. Obasanjo, still left a room for the welfare of Nigerians in all his policies and would never have allowed some of the actions and activities that have not only manifested, but pumped up under the nose of Tinubu.
Take for example the oil theft currently going on in the Niger Delta. Would it have happened under Obasanjo that half of the proceeds of Nigeria’s oil production ends up in private pockets? But this is the scourge currently besetting Nigeria. Imagine what the recovery of this stolen wealth could have done to the economy. It could have taken care of the economic needs of the country, which Tinubu claims to be solving by plunging the people into such untold hardship.
Nigeria is the only country under the aegis of Organasation of Petrol Exporting Countries (OPEC), which did not profit from the different global events that shot up oil prices, in recent years from the COVID-19 to the wars in Ukraine and most recently, the Middle East owing substantially to the activities of these oil thieves.
Instead of the 2.5million barrels per day OPEC quota, the country has remained at 1.3million per day production level for years on and on, while the rest are blown up in the wind. This is even when the usual economic sabotage from militants who blow up oil facilities in the creeks or kidnap oil workers, which used to account for such low production, have since disappeared.
During the period Obasanjo depicted, the world has heard some of the wackiest stories beyond the contemplation to human mind. Imagine a ship fully-loaded with stolen crudes, after managing as usual to escape the “vigilant eyes” of the Nigerian security apparatchik, being arrested in a foreign country and sent back to Nigeria. The expectation would be that the ship would be seized, its contents returned or sold and not only that the crew are arrested, but a massive onslaught would therefrom be unleashed to fish out others in the chain of the syndicate.
But what did the world hear? The said ship with the content of crude buried in its bowels, was reportedly set ablaze. Till date nothing else has been heard. Not even those who were reportedly arrested inside the ship have been brought to trial not to talk of extending the dragnet to include capturing those pulling the strings from behind the scene and ultimately tighten the noose to asphyxiate the obvious syndicate. In fact, after the initial noise, the matter ha since died down. if anything ever happened thereafter, nobody knows.
Now, anyone slightly above the imbecilic fringes, would agree that stopping the massive stealing of Nigerian oil and ramping up the production level is where any plausible reform ought to start. But what do you have? Tinubu and his men, having promised to continue where Buhari stopped, believes the only way to his own idea of reform is to squeeze the last air from Nigerians, as his policies indicate.
Yes! Obasanjo in his eight years in office actually made the constant increase of price of petroleum products a state policy. But not even in his craziest of moments did he contemplate what Tinubu did. Minutes after taking the oath of office, Tinubu unilaterally and some say, whimsically announced the end of subsidy on the Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), otherwise known as petrol. This shot the pump price from N189 to N560. In the last few months, the price has since shot-up several times to the present N1,200 or more.
The immediate reaction was not only witnessed in the instant concomitant jump in the prices of commodities, but the progressive rise in over the month so much that a bottle of groundnuts that cost N120, and a crate of egg that were sold for N300, have since jumped to N3,000 and N4,500 respectively. Even garri that used to be the last hope of the common man in Nigeria, has now become a luxury with the cost jumping to more than 500 per cent in recent months.
Obasanjo would never have allowed the level of provincial and nepotistic government Tinubu is running today, which is beyond the mimic of what Buhari introduced and which he has taken to a new high. A situation where the now ubiquitous Lagos Boys have completely taken over the show and are looming writ-large is not only out of the question, but totally impossible under the former President.
Tinubu had said in his reply: “Brazen illegality and assault on the Constitution of Nigeria reached a disturbing height under the leadership of Chief Obasanjo. During Obasanjo’s era, the unconstitutional impeachment of four governors who belonged to his party occurred. The governors impeached by minority members of the Houses of Assembly were Joshua Dariye of Plateau, Rashidi Ladoja of Oyo, Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti and Diepreye Alamieyeseigha of Bayelsa. A man under whose watch all of these egregious infractions occurred should certainly not be the one to give any lecture on leadership and corruption. He should not be taken seriously as he reeks of profound hypocrisy of the worst form.”
Ironically, Nuhu Ribadu, former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), who Obasanjo used to perpetrate the said heist on the governors, is today the National Security Adviser (NSA), in charge of all the security architecture in the country. What a contradiction in terms! The implication is obvious, even to the unwary.
While we repeat without equivocation that we are on all fours with Obasanjo on all the issues raised and we are greatly appalled by the tenure of Tinubu, who instead of withdrawing to his inner room, doing some reassessment and probably showing some remorse and retracing his steps and cause some redeeming actions to take place, is not only assuming a dismissive mien but engaging a combative gear.
These, we dare say, will come to naught. No one can fight the truth. No matter the nature of combustive language or gragra fight, lies will never become the truth. Obasanjo has told the truth. Incidentally, when he was in government, Tinubu and the others who formed the bulk of the opposition, told him the same truth about the impunity and bad behaviour of his government. Now, it is his turn.
But the difference is that while the Obasanjo era posted the greatest moments in recent Nigerian history where the economy grew in leaps and bounds, while that era saw Nigeria as the investment destination of the world and while the economy was the largest in Africa, under Buhari and Tinubu the reverse is the case.
It is not only that Nigeria is hosting the flag as the poorest nation in the world, it has also assumed the inglorious toga as one of the four most corrupt nations. If things continue to move progressively down the slope as it is currently, there is no doubt that even before the last days of his four-year tenure, Nigeria would have eventually attained its destination as a failed state or worse as Obasanjo predicted.
The answer is not in engaging in hiring attack dogs and unleashing them to real or imaginary enemies or stepping into the ring against the former President. Tinubu must copy what Obasanjo did. One of them purge himself of the iniquity of parochialism and nepotism. He must also strip himself of the arrogance of an untouchable.
To start with, he must retrieve governance from those he has handed it over and ensure a more open, global and futuristic government. There are many Nigerians capable of doing the job. A situation where more than 80 per cent of the government appointments are given to Yoruba people – nay – The Lagos Boys – must be rescinded and must never be allowed to return.
Again, Obasanjo would never have borrowed to sponsor consumption. Obasanjo would never have bought vehicles for members of the National Assembly from proceeds of loans borrowed from other countries – or renovate the house of the Vice President or buy vehicles for his own wife or a yacht. No! He would never have done that.
Obasanjo showed himself a Nigerian, Tinubu is showing himself a Yoruba man. In fact Obasanjo cannot even be closeted in the Nigerian garb. He is more of a global citizen. So, in terms of reckoning both are kilometres apart. The question is in how many global stages, such as the one that hosted Obasanjo would Tinubu appear tomorrow when he leaves government? The clear realisation of this is enough to redirect the thinking of the President.
President Tinubu must realise that stepping into the ring with Obasanjo over matters as clear as those he raised in the US is a recipe for failure. It is even worse when such an engagement takes the shape of measuring height with the former President. No matter how fat a butterfly grows, it can never be seen as a bird and no matter a lizard grows, it can never become a crocodile. That is our view!
In the early hours of Monday, January 26, 2026, Charles Chukwuma Soludo, stormed Onitsha Main Market, reputed to be the biggest enclave for trading and other commercial activities in West Africa, on what he called on-the-spot assessment.
It was a military-style display, reminiscent of the Muhammadu Buhari-Tunde Idiagbon, best-forgotten taskforce days, when soldiers, without warning swooped on markets, broke into their owner’s shops and practically sold available goods to the public at giveaway prices – many their cronies, in the guise of forcing their Essential Commodities policy.
In like manner there and then, the governor ordered the immediate closure of the market after accusing the traders of harbouring criminal intents and engaging in economic sabotage that costs the state a whopping N8billion in lost revenues. To boot, he even warned not only to close the market on a permanent basis, but if need be, even bulldoze it to the ground, should the traders remained recalcitrant in their decision.
Hear him: “Each Monday, we’ll come and inspect. If people are not in their respective shops, it will be shut down again. If you like I don’t mind shutting down this Main Market for the remainder of this year. If you don’t like it, go elsewhere and trade, but if you’re here, we’re not going to allow this plain economic sabotage. Also, we suspect whoever closes their shops to have some criminal intents.”
From the outset, we must state that what the world saw in that spontaneous encounter and subsequent days as the issues therein remained on the front burner, has little place in democracy, neither does it reflect sound, people-oriented leadership under the ethos of what has now been accepted across the globe as the best form of government.
Now, the last time we checked, Soludo is neither a military General nor even a soldier, but a highly-decorated academic, whose influence in the knowledge industry spans beyond education institutions, government – he was formally Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) – to international reckoning – consulting for some of the highest global bodies, including the United Nations.
Now, how does this selfsame global icon, reduce himself to a local dictator, dishing out orders as in regimental commands rather than employing that power of persuasion, which distinguishes brainpower – the emblematic factor of his training from raw strength of dictators in the gun business?
How does it fit? Do concepts like immediate effect and automatic alacrity form part of the recommendations Soludo makes to those global institutions he consulted for? Certainly no! So, why introduce them as his own governance template? That is the confusing, if not the disturbing part.
Is it not becoming clearer now? Is this military-style tendency not finding expression in the audacity captured in that ghoulish spectacle last year, where one Jennifer Elohor Edema, the young lady serving Nigeria under the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, was stripped down to her birthday suit by some youths, visibly inebriated on influences of some brain-damaging substances, who were working for Soludo’s government?
By the way, when last did anyone hear anything about those criminals, outside the initial apparent crocodile tears at government places in Awka? Has anyone heard of any form of punishment? Have they been arraigned in court? If yes, what is the state of the trial?
In the instant case, we particularly detest the governor’s attempt to feign ignorance of the issues behind the conduct of the traders or his efforts to bury them under the veneer of righteous anger. To so do is deceitful, arrogant, if not self-serving – elements that seem to have, so unfortunately, formed part of the governance structure in Anambra State, as in most other states across the country, including the central government.
The issue here, if Soludo needs be reminded, is about the fate of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), currently serving life sentence at a facility in Sokoto, to where he was sent by Justice James Omotoso of the Federal High Court, Abuja.
Of course, the governor was right in claiming that the dangerous security situation in the state has changed for the better and that Anambra is no longer the killing field it was until recently. Obviously, the blood-thirsty terrorists responsible for the carnages witnessed in the state, including those ostensibly aimed at enforcement of the sit at home orders, seem to be on holiday and from the look of things are no longer returning.
So, if the governor says security or insecurity of the traders is no longer the big issue, he has a foundation to so state. At least for the first time in recent years, Christmas was celebrated in the entire Igboland with the usual fanfare under the robust atmosphere devoid of fear. That alone gives credence to the extent of these changes.
But that is not the end of the story. Kanu’s fresh ordeal seems to have introduced a new chapter to the entire saga. Now, the current sit-at-home option appears no longer out of fear of being attacked or killed, but the willingness of the traders to donate every Monday, in solidarity with the IPOB leader. This was evident in the Tuesday demonstration, where the message of the traders who thronged the streets of Onitsha, was clearly delivered with renditions like – Nnamdi Kanu is another saviour.
Therefore, Soludo, must be a complete novice or pathologically naïve to claim he is not aware of this new sentiment. But he is neither of the two. There is no way the governor would not have been seized of the compelling emotions around him.
So, for him to put up that show on Monday, is nothing but a gambit tailored towards gaslighting the public. His feigned anger against the traders for not opening their shops is as manipulative as it is deceitful, just as argument thereto regarding the economy implications is as puerile as it is spurious.
It is demonstrative of lack of emotional intelligence, as it showcases the absence of the required synergy between the government and the people, a phenomenon that has become characteristic in the South East in recent years, where a huge gulf and trust deficit exist between the people and those who lead them.
It is indeed laughable when South East governors, including Soludo, lay claims to the current calm in Igboland, when on the contrary, many of them are accused of being collaborators, either as active agents of being complicit through their conspiracy of silence.
Who does not know that the late President Muhammadu Buhari, was the vector that transported that killer disease to Igboland? Dan Nwanyanwu, National Chairman of the Zenith Labour Party (ZLP), has remained relentless in establishing this fact most pungently in the past and even quite recently.
Soludo, in his chest-beating mode, gives the impression that he somehow sprung a genie out of the magic lamp to create a sudden miracle that turned the parlous security situation around. No! It was the death of Buhari that ended the blitzkrieg in the South East. Simplicita!
Where was this genie when during the Buhari days, when the Aguata Local Government headquarters, where he comes from was razed to the ground or when a swathe of Ihiala and adjoining areas in the state became a hunting ground for the rampaging terrorists, codenamed Unknown Gunmen.
He was only content in the open and shut attitude of dismissing the carnage they wrought as the handiwork of Kanu’s Eastern Security Network (ESN), even when the group swore on their father’s grave that they were not involved.
Indeed, if there is ever going to be anything good in the government of President Bola Tinubu, it is the fact that he is not as hungry for the blood of the Igbo man as Buhari, who never hid the fact of his desire to continue the civil war against Ndigbo, more than 50 years after.
Had Tinubu, who upped the ante in the marginalisation of Ndigbo in many ways, escalated this penchant by toeing the line as part of his continuation of the Buhari legacy, which he promised Nigerians, he might have renewed the military contract Asari Dokubo claimed to have with Buhari.
Yes, though he never revealed details of the so-called contract, its nature could be gleaned from the manner the people were dying wotowotowoto, as the Niger Delta warlord, himself gloated about some years back.
He even backed his gloating up in that viral video, with a display of an AK-47, boasting how he would use the weapon to cure Ndigbo their “madness.” Is it not surprising that in all his public comments, neither Soludo nor his South East colleagues ever mentioned this obvious threat to his people.
So, nobody is deceived by the governor acting like Idi Amin of Uganda, who went berserk because he could not get more money printed from his central bank. Nobody is moved by his threat to even bulldoze that market. He is only being clever by half, if not acting a script.
It does not remove the fact that he and his colleagues suddenly went mute, then and now and remained tongue-tied at a historic moment when Ndigbo are battling to extricate themselves from the soggy, foggy, belly of the whale, like the biblical Jonah, as they are in Nigeria today. It does not belittle the fact that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is a metaphor for that horrible situation.
It is even worse that Soludo, arguably the most intellectually-gifted governor in Nigeria today, would be introducing some ethnic, sectional or indigene-based sentiments into the matter by trumpeting that those pursing the sit at home drive are not from Anambra. What a shame!
Who cares? Instead of such obtuse, infantile, if not asinine suggestion, would it not be more apposite for him to conduct a census in the entire Anambra, Aguata, his local government, Isuofia, his community and even the Soludo family to determine the number of Igbo people that are happy with the fate of not only Kanu, but Ndigbo in the hands of his friends in high authority today?
We hear that the traders have caved in. So, by Monday, expectedly, they would return to their shops – though definitely against their will. Soludo, would have scored another point and proven himself a strong man. But is it not a crab that makes itself king in shallow waters? Times shall tell!
The systematic bastardisation of Nigeria and its degraded worth in the eyes of the global community seem to have reached to its inglorious height in recent months. How damning!
Each day, the largest country of black people on earth seems to be gliding uncontrollably down the slippery slope of infamy where countries which hitherto stand in awe and trepidation, now practically spit at its global image.
Only recently, Burkina Faso, one of the smallest countries on the West African sub-region – a country with total worth far less than Lagos got Abuja crawling on its knees to Ouagadougou to plead for the release of a military aircraft flying the Nigerian flag.
Yes! It took a whole 10 days for the Nigerian Air Force C-130 and 11 soldiers on board to breathe the air of freedom once again, after they were detained in the hunger-ravaged African country for making an emergency landing – a routine aviation procedure that is ironed out in a matter of hours with nothing more than a mere explanation required.
But in this case, it took a special delegation of top Nigerian officials to move to the country with apology letter in hand to beg for the freedom of the detained men and plane from the Burkinabe authorities, whose personnel, openly walked on air to stamp their importance. Compatriots, this is your country – the giant of Africa.
Last year, it took a cough at the Oval Office Washington for Aso Rock Villa to catch cold and harass itself into a frenzy in search for way out of the decade-old issue of mass slaughtering of Nigerians by terrorists in addition to other forms of high crimes that have seized the country over the years.
Yet, even with all the frantic, frenetic and impulsive thrashing around, including a unilateral declaration of State of Emergency on security, what has come out of it?
It took the same United States, to make a decisive statement with the Christmas day bombing of a supposed hideout in Sokoto, said to have decimated scores of terrorist, who had assembled to plot how to wreak another havoc across the country as has become traditional during the yuletide season over the recent years.
But were these disgraceful outings limited to domestic affairs, it would have been more tolerable. But, unfortunately, it is not.
Internationally too, the tiger has also lost its tigritude. The same Nigeria that virtually stood shoulder to shoulder, gazing eyeball to eyeball as it confronted powerful western nations in a singular bid to end apartheid in South Africa – yes, the same Nigeria that took it upon itself to end the mass slaughtering in Liberia and Sierra Leone, is today cowering in its cocoon over issues it ought to have taken the lead in presenting the African perspective.
Last year, it was South Africa that roared like a lion by confronting Israel over the blitzkrieg in Gaza – going as far as taking the country to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at The Hague, The Netherlands.
Today, it is Ghana that is taking charge at the world stage, with its voice echoing beyond the seas and wildernesses over the US action in Venezuela where its special forces arrested Nicolas Maduro – that country’s President on Saturday.
“Ghana expresses strong reservations against unilateral use of force and strongly deplores such acts that violate the Charter of the United Nations and international law, as well as the sovereignty, territorial integrity, and political independence of States.
“The Ghanaian Government is keenly following the situation in Venezuela with great concern, and notes that such assaults on international law, attempts at the occupation of foreign territories and apparent external control of oil resources have extremely adverse implications on international stability and the global order.
“Ghana also notes with deep concern statements by US President, Donald Trump, that the US will “run” Venezuela “until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition” and that US large oil companies will be asked to “go in.”
“These declarations are reminiscent of the colonial and imperialist era. They set a dangerous precedent for the global order. Such colonial ambitions should have no place in the post-Second World War era.
“To allow this is to put the international community at great risk and undermine the sovereignty of every country. Ghana, therefore, re-affirms its commitment to the principle of self-determination and holds the firm view that only the Venezuelan people should freely determine their political and democratic future.
“Ghana calls for immediate de-escalation and the release of President Maduro and his wife. The Government of Ghana shall maintain and defend its long-held principled position against invasion, occupation, colonialism, apartheid, disregard for sovereignty and all forms of violation of international law.”
That was Accra’s bold and fearless response to the Venezuelan saga. Now where is Nigeria? Where is President Bola Tinubu? Mum is the word. The last we heard from our President was via an image of him having lunch with Paul Kagame, President of Rwanda in Paris. No single word uttered – just a picture!
Even that has also run into its own controversy as the image is now being disputed, because experts are convinced that it is AI-generated. How bad could it get! How deep could a country sink into the morass of infamy! How terrible!
But need anyone look far to ascertain the reason for this parlous situation and progressive dip into the bottomless pit of hopelessness. Of course, not! The answer is very apparent.
It is all about legitimacy and integrity of the leadership of the individual countries. John Dramani Mahama, could stand anywhere on the world stage today to declare that the mandate he holds as President derives from the people of Ghana. Cyril Ramaphosa could also swear in like manner that he enjoys the mandate of South Africans.
Could Tinubu honestly make the same claims today? That is the difference. When Sam Amadi, Harvard-trained lawyer, captured the Nigerian variant of strategy for election victory as the ability to bribe the institutions – INEC, judiciary and security authorities, rather than constituency mapping and messaging to convince the people – this is the result.
When Chidi Odinkalu, a professor of law, states categorically that Tinubu did not need the votes of Nigerians but corrupt INEC and the judiciary, to be President, the consequence is illegitimacy, lack of credibility and a country limbo.
The African Democratic Congress (ADC), was even more emphatic when it linked Tinubu’s silence to the fear of being served the Maduro treatment based on the evidently fraudulent 2023 presidential election that brought him to power, the consequences he has been battling with till date.
Bolaji Abdullahi, its spokesman, recalled how the government of the ousted President was widely condemned as illegitimate and deeply flawed by nine governments across Latin America, the European Union, and international democratic institutions.
Stressing how political opponents were barred from contesting, peaceful protests met with violence, and state institutions weaponised against the very citizens, he pointed to the celebration that followed Maduro’s fate to underscore his argument, stating: “When citizens pour into the streets in celebration, it reveals more than approval of an intervention; it exposes the bankruptcy of the regime that has been upended.”
Back home, he was no less so: “Let’s be clear: the Nigerian government’s choice of silence at this moment has nothing to do with neutrality. Instead, it reveals a government that lacks confidence simply because it lacks integrity. In Nigeria, in Venezuela, and across the world, democracy must mean more than ballots and electoralism. It must translate to freedom, fairness, and a happier life for the citizens.
“In this context, the ADC believes that the situation in Venezuela is a cautionary tale to all dictators, including the supposedly elected ones, and election riggers everywhere. The world is watching, and contrived mandates will no longer find a place to hide.”
How would anyone dispute this position? The naysayer must give a credible reason for the rapid Nigeria’s current drift to a one-party state, despite the evidential failures of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on all fronts of developments since coming to power in 2015.
Why, for instance are all the 36 governors of Nigeria struggling for space in the All Progressives Congress (APC) and declaring open support for Tinubu, even when the President has posted the most disastrous if not the worst outing in Nigerian history, if they were not being corralled to do so.
Why would a Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) arrogate to himself the power of life and death and insist that Siminalayi Fubara, his successor as Rivers State Governor must be divested of his free choice to contest for re-election as part of a strange “agreement?”
The real story is that Nigeria is no different from Venezuela under Maduro. That a repeat of the 2023 fraudulent presidential election will not only continue to produce a lame-duck President that will either be a puppet a weakling, or a disgrace rolled into one. That will be the real TRAGEDY!
Nigerians, nay, the world woke up on Monday morning to the shocking news of yet again, the abduction of students in the country – this time at the Government Girls Comprehensive Secondary School, Maga, Kebbi State.
The incident has now added to the long list of a phenomenon, which started on the night of April 14, 2014 with the kidnap of the students of the Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, an episode now popularly known as the Chibok Girls saga.
When an uproar reverberated across the globe following the Chibok incident, with world leaders weighing in on the matter, including Michelle Obama, former US first lady, who took it personally by joining the campaign to free the young girls, it was an instant response to the gory picture that hovered in the firmament over the fate of of such young lasses, many still in their puberty stage in the hands of such dangerous criminals.
Who would have thought that the development would soon become a constant feature that would continue to smear the nation’s landscape, especially with the exit of then President Goodluck Jonathan, who had suffered the butt of national and international ridicule, as the incident was attributed to him with the derisive term – cluelessness – was eventually tossed out of office as a result?
On the contrary, it turned out that Muhammadu Buhari, his successor, posted a worse outing, despite his record as a General of the Nigerian Army and former Military Head of State, who during his times as the latter, was known as a no-nonsense leader.
Indeed, while Jonathan was clueless, Buhari practically dozed, slept or actually slumbered on the same issue. Under him, the situation assumed an almost epidemic proportion – from Dapchi Girls, which saw the abduction of 110 students from the Girls’ Science and Technical College (GGSTC), Dapchi in Bulabulin, Bursari Local Government area of Yobe State, on February 19, 2018, to the 279 female students of Government Girls Science Secondary School, a boarding school in Jangebe, Zamfara State on February 26, 2021, which came few months after about 300 students of Government Science Secondary School, Kankara, Katsina State, on December 11, 2020.
During this period, Kaduna suffered some of the worst hits. First, 150 students of the Bethel Baptist High School, in 2021 and then the 2024 edition, when about 285 students were taken from their school in Kuriga, in Chikun Local Government Area.
These are just some of the incidents that quickly come to mind. There are many other cases of similar nature before this latest addition in Maga, where 25 girls were picked up and herded into the bush like cattle.
Now this was the situation under which President Bola Tinubu, had actually packed his bag preparatory to boarding his much-fancied executive jet en-route South Africa and Angola for the 20th G20 Summit of leaders in South Africa and thereafter proceed to Luanda to attend the Seventh African Union-European Union (AU-EU) Summit.
Indications coming from the Villa, in Abuja, appear confusing, as it suggests “postponement” rather than outright “cancellation,” going by the statement of Bayo Onanuga, the President’s main spokesman, on Thursday.
Onanuga, wrote: “Disturbed by the security breaches in Kebbi State and Monday’s attack by bandits against worshippers at Christ Apostolic Church, Eruku, President Tinubu decided to suspend his departure.
“He now awaits reports from Vice President Kashim Shettima, who paid a sympathy visit to Kebbi on his behalf, as well as reports from the police and the Department of State Services regarding the attack in Kwara.”
Anyone could bet and be sure that the trip was paused substantially due to the general outcry in the country over the move and that even now, the pull similar to the bee to the nectar remains too strong that he might actually step on the plane before the events end.
Pray! What is his role and of what benefit would he willingly stain the floor of these events with the blood of his countrymen with which his feet are currently smeared?
Pray! With which face would the President be sitting among these leaders, considering the situation in his country, which is practically on intense inferno currently? How would he handle the stolen glances? Knowing the world of diplomacy where much are ensconced in those deep stares and benign but deceptive smiles, those sympathies he would receive could obviously be more pretended than genuine and he would become the butt of private jokes and conversations thereafter.
Remember the heat that attended the discovery of a headless body floating on the Thames River in the UK in 2001 and how life nearly came to a halt in the country as a result.
Now imagine Kier Starmer the current Prime Minister stepping into British Airways en-route the same South Africa or even United Nations summit without resolving the issue of a stolen pet-dog or assuaging the feeling of that little blue-eyed girl ruing over her loss, let alone one young British school girl being kidnapped and in the hands of mindless criminals. Just imagine it!
Did the US not deploy all its intelligence and military might in a multi-million-dollar operation just to rescue one of its citizens the terrorists currently tormenting Nigeria were too inebriated in their madness to abduct.
Now, consider a Donald Trump, even in his extreme eccentric nature, mounting Air Force One and jetting out to France, China or Saudi Arabia to sign some trillion-dollar military hardware contracts capable of jolting the US economy to a 50-year-record high, while one American Marine is in captivity, let alone some 20 students of a college in Alabama. Would the heat generated therefrom not be enough to power a spacecraft?
Why must Nigeria be different? Is the life of a Nigerian worth less than that of a dog in Britain? Does Tinubu consider the life of the school girl in Dapchi, Kaduna or Maga less valuable than that of her counterpart in Chicago? If no, why not stay back and prove it?
We must say so, unequivocally! Nothing – economically, socially, politically, globally – is more important than the rescue of these 25 young girls. Whether postponed or paused Tinubu must not be found anywhere near that aircraft. In fact, he must not leave Nigeria until those girls are rescued! Nothing could be more serious, nothing more valuable!
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