The Nation Newspaper

Category: Sunday

Goodluck Jonathan’s metamorphosis

Former president Goodluck Jonathan had all along been known as a very cautious man, politician and president. His last assignment observing the November 24, 2025 Guinea-Bissau elections, and his incredibly perceptive and strong reaction to the coup that upstaged the polls, however, suggested that either Nigerians didn’t quite know the man or he had undergone an incredible metamorphosis since his misadventure into president election politics in 2022 and last October. Dr Jonathan had led the West African Elders Forum Election Observation Mission to monitor Guinea-Bissau’s presidential and legislative elections. The election pitted incumbent president Umaro Embalo, candidate of the Madem‑G15 party, against leading opposition candidate Fernando Dias, candidate of the Party for Social Renewal (PRS) and his coalition partners. But on November 26, a day before the results were officially released, the unimaginable occurred. The results were annulled, a coup was declared in the most unusual fashion, first by the president himself, and later by the coup leaders who were the president’s military allies, while a supposedly one-year transition regime was emplaced.

The problem with the Guinea-Bissau polls is not just that the now ‘deposed’ president connived at a coup that subverted the elections, or that his military allies led the coup, or that he had in fact lost the election and needed an excuse not to hand over to the presumed winner, Mr Dias, or that this would be the third time he would flirt with coups d’etat, having assumed office on the back of a forcible claim to the office in 2019 via a 54 percent runoff vote. Or even that he repeated the evil ploy midway into his presidency in 2022, years before the latest chicanery. In fact, hapless Guinea-Bissau can have all the tragic drama it wants, and perhaps with a little help from outside can find a resolution that would power their democracy and lift the country out of the developmental doldrums years of leadership incompetence and corruption, and a national reputation as a drug courier hub, had sentenced the country. Furthermore, many commentators have made one or two uncomplimentary remarks about the lousy change of guard in Guinea-Bissau, including the increasingly impotent United Nations castrated and rendered spineless by the warmongering and apoplectic United States president Donald Trump.

The problem is that former president Jonathan, who has seemed to acquire new political and leadership clothes, is giving Nigerians tough bones to chew and wearing odd clothes. The clothes are paradoxically fitting, but they were revealed by the Guinea-Bissau polls and the coup which trapped the former Nigerian president for a day in that country. Soon after he was evacuated from the coup-prone nation, Dr Jonathan unleashed a fusillade of denunciations against the ‘deposed’ President Embalo and the coup leaders. Though used to waffling, on this occasion, Dr Jonathan minced no words in damning the chicanery he believed the exiled Guinea-Bissau president had disreputably enacted. And he was quite assertive in his opinion, indeed very definitive.

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Hear him at length: “What happened in Guinea-Bissau is quite disturbing to me, a person who believes in democracy. In fact, I feel more pain than the day I called Buhari to congratulate him when I lost the election as a sitting president. It is painful for me that President Embaló was the one announcing a military takeover of the government. It is totally unacceptable. What happened in Guinea-Bissau, I would not call it a coup; it was not a coup. For lack of a better word, I will say it was a ceremonial coup because it was President Embaló who announced the coup before the military later came up to address the world that they were in charge of the government.”

Still animated and angry, he added: “Embaló had already announced that there was a coup, which is strange. Not only announcing the coup, but Embaló, while the coup took place, was using his phone and addressing media organisations across the world that he had been arrested. I’m a Nigerian close to 70, and I know how they keep Heads of State when a coup takes place. They cannot be playing pranks; nobody should call others fools. There is no way there will be a military coup at a time when they were about to announce election results, and the president was the person who announced the coup. It doesn’t happen anywhere.”

Though there were a few moments in his denunciations when his characteristic inclination for excessive caution peered out, on the whole, however, he pulled the peroration off admirably. It was a relief to hear the former Nigerian president declaim convincingly on a subject dear to the hearts of many Nigerians and West Africans who had endured decades of terror under military jackboots. He was not as definitive after the 2023 presidential election despite its cleanness and fairness, and he inexplicably and unwisely tried to re-enter the 2027 presidential race for an office that obviously continues to tantalise him. But on the occasion of the Guinea-Bissau poll and the concomitant coup contrived against it, Dr Jonathan was firm and brilliant, in fact elegant. Nigerians will hope his new self is not an aberration, a caricature of his old self, or a gargoyle imitating his ambitious self.

December 7, 2025
Trump, Saudi Arabia shock the world

US president Donald Trump has hosted all sorts of foreign leaders in his uninspiring pursuit of economic diplomacy and personal self-aggrandisement. Some of them he disrespects so intensely that it borders on bigotry, and some others he snivels before them that it is so befuddling. Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky and South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa are examples of leaders who could not seem to place a foot right; but Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman al Saud (famously called MBS), Qatar’sTamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and Syria’s new leader and former al-Qaeda-affiliated operative, Ahmed al-Sharaa, are examples of the other class whose business deals with Mr Trump appear to expiate their dangerous predilections.

Mr Ramaphosa is of course completely innocent of the accusation of white genocide against White farmers, and Mr Zelensky is fighting for the freedom and independence of Ukraine. On the other hand, MBS, answering questions during his November visit to the White House, acknowledged that the murder of Saudi journalist and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Turkey in 2018 was a ‘painful mistake, but denied ordering it. Despite US intelligence confirming MBS ordered the hit, Mr Trump did not so much as wince during the interaction. Instead, he growled at the journalist who asked the crown prince the question. Al Thani has many question marks on his head regarding his links to jihadist groups, but his plane gift to the US president obviously absolves him of every allegation. And Syria’s al-Sharaa, despite his past as an al-Qaeda commander, received the backing of MBS who goes on to orchestrate the former’s November visit to the White House.

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What probably shocked the world the most was how cavalierly and spontaneously Mr Trump came to the defence of MBS. He asked the reporter who queried MBS on the murder not to embarrass the Saudi crown prince, declared that MBS knew nothing about the crime, and dismissively suggested that Mr Khashoggi was controversial and not liked, and ‘things happen’. No one ever thought the day would come when an American president would treat murder so offhandedly. Well, the promise of ‘nearly $1 trillion Saudi investments in new US partnerships are obviously capable of rewriting American and global jurisprudence and moral code.

December 7, 2025
No objection, Mr. Trump
- America’s decision to impose visa ban on Nigerians with link to terrorism is welcome
I wholeheartedly welcome President Donald Trump’s decision to restrict visas to Nigerians who violate religious rights. The U.S. Department of State said in a statement titled: ‘Combating Egregious Anti-Christian Violence in Nigeria and Globally,’ that the U.S. was taking a decisive action in response to the mass killings and violence against Christians by radical terrorists, ethnic militia and other violent actors in Nigeria and beyond.

“A new policy under Section 212(a)(3)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act will allow the State Department to restrict visa issuance to individuals who have directed, authorised, significantly supported, participated in, or carried out violations of religious freedom and, where appropriate, their immediate family members.”

It added that “As President Trump made clear, the ‘United States cannot stand by while such atrocities are happening in Nigeria, and numerous other countries.’ This policy will apply to Nigeria and any other governments or individuals engaged in violations of religious freedom.”

I would indeed appreciate it if the World’s Number One Citizen could extend such punishment to those responsible for corruption and bad governance generally because they are the ones that are making Nigeria and Nigerians a laughing stock all over the world, because of their exodus to places outside their God-chosen country, for sanctuary.

Trump’s latest decision must have been informed by his unbending belief that there is religious genocide in Nigeria, despite the denials by the Federal Government and some other groups in and outside the country. Mr Trump is entitled to his opinion and I would not even mind whatever sanctions he applied to people violating religious rights because this is an inalienable right that even God Almighty had in His wisdom given to all humans, without exception. When He created us, he did not impose any particular religion on anyone. Indeed, God gave us the Free Will to decide between good and evil; including the freedom of what or which God or god to worship.

I do not therefore know how some misguided, ill-educated individuals would impose it on themselves the power to want everybody else to sleep and face where they are facing religion-wise. Those who had been so indoctrinated constitute the chunk of those now troubling the nation. Unfortunately, what is paining me in all of these is the fact that it is the whole country that is picking the avoidable bills for such indoctrinations that were done with selfish class motives by some religious and political interests in the North for decades. People had been fed all manner of lies in the name of religion, whereas at the bottom of it all is the intention to keep the misguided perpetually ignorant and unable to differentiate their left from their right hand.

We have seen the consequences of religious hate in several countries like Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Central African Republic (CAR), Lebanon, India and Pakistan, to mention only a few. Their experiences are not the kind of thing one would wish for Nigeria or even an enemy country. So, if help is going to come by way of sanctions for elites, political or religious, that fan the embers of such dichotomies, I have nothing against it. This is especially so in a situation where nothing else seems capable of checking such trend. Nigeria’s elites must be some of the most in the world that cannot do without travelling to the United States, and Trump knows this insatiable appetite on their part.

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I cannot understand, for instance, a situation like that which happened to Deborah Samuel Yakubu in 2022. That it could happen at all in 21st Century Nigeria was bad enough. It pained me to the marrows the more as a Christian. How could life just be snuffed out of a 21-year-old second-year student by her Muslim classmates who accused her of posting a “blasphemous” comment against the Islamic Prophet Muhammad in a student WhatsApp study group? She felt such a platform should be for sharing of things having to do with their studies only; a not particularly illegitimate statement.

To think that this was the reason she was dragged out from the security post at Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto, where she had been hidden, and stoned to death while her body was then set ablaze, took something off our humanity as a nation. Those who committed the heinous murder even had the temerity to exhibit their barbarity online by showing the video to the world. And that in a state where there is a sitting governor with all the instruments of power. That those accused of her murder are still walking free three years after leaves a sour taste in the mouth. This was despite the national outrage and international condemnation, highlighting ongoing issues with religious violence and blasphemy laws in the country.

The governor of the state where such grievous harm was done may not have been guilty of directing or authorising violations of religious freedom; he is certainly guilty of vicariously supporting such violations by his inability to bring such murderers to justice. They are murderers; it is when Nigerians want to deodorise crimes that they look for all manner of technical subterfuge to describe it in order to lessen the import of the crimes. They cannot hide behind one finger by saying Miss Samuel’s killers did it for their religion. I do not know of any religion that permits people to take the lives of others in the name of blasphemy.

So, if sanction like the one that Trump just came up with will help rein in such barbarity by preventing the governor of such a state from entering a place like the United States where our big people crave to enter, so be it. May be that would force them to recall those they had fed with all manner of wrong indoctrinations so they could make them regurgitate them and now feed them aright spiritually.

Every Nigerian would benefit from such re-indoctrination because it would save us the enormous costs we are spending to prosecute this needless war against banditry, terrorism and allied crimes. These are resources we could jolly well have deployed for the general good in the areas of power, health, roads, energy, and what have you.

That the Deborah Samuel incident was not an isolated one is indeed depressing. There had been several other such incidents in parts of the North that went the way of Samuel’s. These are some of the things that many outsiders are seeing and calling genocide against Christians in Nigeria.

AI overview defines genocide as ”the deliberate, systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group, encompassing acts like killing, causing serious harm, imposing harsh living conditions, preventing births, or forcibly transferring children, all with the specific intent to eliminate the group as such, as defined by the UN Genocide Convention. Coined by Raphael Lemkin, it’s an international crime targeting a group’s identity, not just its members”. The operational word that many people look for in genocide is ‘mass killing’ or ‘mass murder’, or mass whatever that can systematically lead to the extermination of a particular group. Unfortunately, this is not the definition under International Law. Mass killing is not a mandatory element for the crime of genocide.

It is little drops of water such as the Deborah Samuel’s that many people are now adding together to make up the mighty ocean of what they call genocide. It is not just the attacks on churches or abduction of students and children in Christian schools. These seemingly isolated cases are a national tragedy because it is their aggregate that is giving Nigeria the bad name or reputation of ‘Country of Particular Concern’. Unfortunately, too, many of what eventually led to such classification are politically motivated. This is why the Federal Government cannot stand aloof and see these cases as a matter concerning the states where they occur alone. It is the Federal Government that is absorbing the shocks of the inactions in states where these incidents occur. It is the one feeling the heat.

There is no doubt that there is general insecurity in the land that has claimed many lives and we are probably still counting. Which is condemnable all the same. Not even the Federal Government is denying this fact. And, to the extent that provision of adequate security for all citizens is a cardinal duty of government, the government has an abiding responsibility to protect them, irrespective of their faith or lack of it.

All said; whether it is insecurity or genocide, the government has a duty to ensure safety of all citizens. And it must continue to do that. But not many Nigerians are happy that the real big names behind terror in the country are not made public, not to talk of prosecuting them. Nigerians and indeed the international community would appreciate if these people can be named and shamed, and have their day in court. Terror is like fire; take out oxygen and the fire gets extinguished. Take out the financiers, it is a matter of time; terror itself would dry to its root.

But what the terrorists and their promoters do not seem to understand is that no particular religion has a monopoly of violence. The only thing is that the teachings of the religions differ. So many Christian leaders have been expressing frustration on these unprovoked attacks that have been given the country a name that is not its own. Some have told their members to be coming to church armed. The other day, one even went to the extent of telling his members to (ti ese ile bo) ‘look inwards’, that is take to unorthodox means to respond to the situation.

What they are all saying is that the government has to be more drastic on this matter if we are to get out of it anytime soon. Two major sources of illicit funds for some people were erased when the Tinubu administration came in 2023. People that were benefitting from the fuel subsidy fraud and floating of the foreign exchange market have since been rendered jobless. Since nature abhors a vacuum, they must find an alternative source of illicit profits which the terror war promises to be, especially with sundry crimes like kidnapping for ransom, etc.

Such people would look for all manner of ways to keep the war alive. But, can Nigeria continue to pour libation on this their new-found sources of illicit profits? I don’t think so. Even if the country is, it is unlikely the international community is. Terror against one, the world seems to have realised, is terror against all. That seems the message Trump has been harping on. If ‘protecting’ Christians provides a convenient excuse for that, why not exploit it?
December 7, 2025
Naming and shaming of sponsors as solution to escalating terrorism in Nigeria

I believe that with political will and cooperation of the Northern elite, we can flush out these vermin in our blood in six months.

It is a choice, and not a difficult one. Bello Tunji and Dogo Gide are human beings. The bandits are not spirits. We only need to be spirited” –

Sam Omatseye in ‘The Maidens of Maga’, Monday, December 1, 2025.

“If Nigeria truly wants to break the cycle of insecurity, corruption in defence spending, weak intelligence coordination, and the embarrassing militarisation of internal policing, then the appointment of General Christopher Musa as Minister of Defence must come with a national agenda—clear, uncompromising, and measurable.

Nigeria is too security-fractured for business as usual.

We need a Defence Minister who will disrupt the old order, confront the rot, and rebuild trust between the armed forces and the citizens” –

culled from Idowu Oboro’s:

“If General Christopher Musa Becomes Minister of Defence: The Agenda Nigerians Must Demand”

Last week on these pages I wrote, quoting Chima – Oforgu

in his seminal work on terrorism in Nigeria: “Who is really paying for Nigeria’s bloodbath?

We talk endlessly about “terrorists”, “Fulani herdsmen”, “bandits” – as if they are ghosts who appear from thin air, armed to the teeth, fuelled, fed and endlessly re-supplied by magic.

They are not ghosts.

They are funded.

And the sponsors are not barefoot militants in the bush – they are people in suits, kaftans and uniforms; sitting in air-conditioned offices in Abuja, Lagos, Kaduna, Dubai and beyond”.

The Nigerian security situation has just been brutally captured in a trending WhatsApp post which, mutatis mutandis, reads as follows:

“Nigeria Is Being Taken Over slowly and in Silence.

This Is Not INSECURITY. It’s a CONQUEST.

Nigeria is currently undergoing a systematic territorial takeover by armed groups. This is not random criminality. It is not isolated insecurity. It is a coordinated expansion of hostile forces exercising real control over Nigerian territory determined, more than ever to turn Nigeria into a radical Islamic country.

In the North-West, bandit networks are displacing entire communities, imposing illegal taxation, controlling farmland, and forcing civilians to either flee or submit. In the North-East, jihadist factions including ISWAP are consolidating safe operating zones, enforcing parallel governance under the pretext of “Sulhu” or peace talks, and building logistical routes deeper into the country.

Both groups are advancing SOUTHWARD.

Their operations are no longer confined to the peripheries.

They are now penetrating Niger, Plateau, Benue, Kogi, and reaching the borders of the Federal Capital Territory.

This is a strategic progression:

Control the rural zones → dominate transportation corridors → threaten cities → challenge the state.

The indicators are clear:

1. Loss of state monopoly on violence in multiple LGAs.

2. Parallel administrations emerging in forest regions.

3. Mass abductions targeting schools and community leaders to cripple social confidence.

4. Strategic raids near Abuja to undermine national authority.

5. Southward infiltration toward economic population centers aimed at causing maximum socio- economic dislocation.

This is what territorial conquest looks like in the 21st century:

Not declarations of war, but the state slowly losing ground to non-state actors who act like governments.

Civil authority retreats.

Armed actors remain.

Communities adapt for survival”.

What to do

Terrorism in Nigeria is complex and multi – dimensional. It has led to devastating consequences, among them, loss of hundreds of thousands of lives, displacement of people, and monumental economic instability. One critical way of addressing insecurity in Nigeria is identifying, and tackling, the financial networks and individuals that sustain these terrorist groups.

One approach is the naming and shaming of terrorism sponsors, which can be a potent tool in curbing, in deed, defeating, terrorism since funding is terrorism’s live wire.

Terrorist organisations rely heavily on funding, both internal and external, to carry out their terrible operations.

These funds are often sourced from wealthy individuals, organizations or from even state actors who choose to support terrorist activities especially for religious purposes as we have here in Nigeria.

In Nigeria, Boko Haram has been known to receive funding from various sources, including local and international sponsors.

Naming and shaming involve publicly identifying individuals or organisations that support terrorist activities. This approach aims at isolating sponsors, disrupt their financial networks as well as deter others from providing similar support.

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Its effectiveness will depend on several factors, including the accuracy of information, international cooperation, and the willingness of governments to take action.

On these pages last week, I proved conclusively, and beyond all reasonable doubt, that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu does not lack the political will to take important political decisions.

What then are the

potential benefits of publicly naming, and shaming, terrorism sponsors?

These include

deterrence, as doing so will naturally deter others from providing such support, fearing reputational damage as well as the legal consequences of being so publicly outed.

This will naturally reduce terrorism since funding, as I indicated earlier, is integral to their multi- pronged activities – be it weapons acquisition, training, kidnapping, killing etc

Another benefit is International cooperation which is of critical importance in successfully fighting terrorism, especially in the Sahel region and neighbouring countries with their porous borders where it is now obvious no country can single – handedly defeat terrorism.

International cooperation can also lead to sanctions such as asset seizures and, even arrests, across several countries, working in synergy.

There is also the additional advantage of domestic pressure.

As things stand today in Nigeria, there are clear evidence of some elements of state security working with terror sponsors, not only to facilitate attacks but, more importantly, to ensure that terrorists are protected from the long arms of the law.

Naming sponsors will galvanise public opinion and push government to take stringent actions against miscreants.

Of course, naming sponsors has its down side. It can lead to retaliation and can even put some lives at risk. Government should, however, be able to adequately protect whistle blowers as they will be providing intelligence against very powerful persons.

Government must also guide against inaccurate evidence which can lead to wrongful accusations thus damaging innocent individuals or organisations.

To effectively do this, the policy should depend mostly on:

Intelligence-led operations in disrupting terrorist networks. There must also be international collaboration with global partners to share information and coordinate efforts.

There must be proactive

community engagement to encourage reporting of suspicious activities.

Highest importance must, however, go to information sourced through financial intelligence – bank records, transfers, suspicious transaction reports etc.

There is equally the very important role of the National Assembly which must waste no time in providing an appropriate legal frame work for the policy.

Several countries have successfully implemented naming and shaming strategies to combat terrorism financing. For instance, the United States’ Terrorist Financing Targeting Center has been instrumental in identifying and sanctioning individuals and organizations supporting terrorist groups.

Concluding, I am not in any way, suggesting naming and shaming of terrorism sponsors as a monocausal solution to what we are seeing increasing in leaps and bounds in our country.

On the contrary, it should be part of a comprehensive strategy to address the root causes of terrorism.

By adopting a multifaceted approach, Nigeria can effectively tackle both the individuals, as well as the financial networks supporting terrorism in Nigeria and thus be able to create a safer environment for us all.

December 7, 2025
Language activism (II)

Long after Charles Darwin completed his ground breaking work on the theory of the evolution of species, he kept it under wraps and for good reason. He clearly recognised the explosive nature of that theory and being a rather mild mannered and religious man, he was reluctant to cause a cataclysmic detonation and so, he sat on it. Later on however, he got the inspiration to publish his work because Alfred Wallace working on the other side of the world from Darwin had come to the same conclusion as he had and there was no longer any excuse to maintain radio silence on his seminal work. He went ahead and published his work and created a new intellectual world. The reverberations from that publication are still shaking the world of science with some people standing staunchly with Darwin and others no less implacably opposed to him. It is therefore expedient to point out at this stage that this article is really not about the theory of evolution. It is, however, a convenient starting point for this article about the aspect of language activism that I have been writing about.

Most people have only a vague knowledge about the theory of evolution but virtually everyone with more than a modicum of education will confidently tell you about the law of the survival of the fittest. This has been used to explain why some people have power, influence and extravagant wealth. They are supposed to hold that position because they have been found out to be the fittest of their kind and deserve to corner all the riches of the world. This thinking has also been used to justify racism and white supremacy. That may indeed be so but nobody has been able to provide any clinching argument to support this. Nobody has been able to do this for the simple reason that Darwin’s work does not lend any support to this contention. Nature in all its vastness does not care about fitness. What it cares about is adaptability. Nature is dynamic and is frequently undergoing fundamental changes and so fitness at any point in time may become a dire liability at the next moment. This is why, it is those that can be adapted to change that will survive and go on to proliferate within any given set of conditions. Mankind in total, has been able to demonstrate great adaptability which is why we have been able to colonise the globe in its entirety. As it is with our species, so it is with the languages we speak. Those languages which can be adapted to changing situations will survive and by the iron laws of nature those that are found wanting in this particular regard, will become extinct in the manner of any plant or animal that is caught in the web of changing environments. No new languages are being formed anywhere in the world at this time and it is clear that the number of languages spoken in the world will be reduced at an increasing rate leading to a corresponding decrease in language diversity thereby going across the grain of evolution. This is because our collective future can only be guaranteed by increasing diversity. To put things in proper perspective, the less diversity we have, the greater the possibility of a massive clear out of a species leading to extinction and that goes against the grain of nature. We encounter this not only in terms of language but also in terms of the foods we eat and the cultures that govern our existence. We must therefore be conservationists in respect of our respective languages. One of the ways that this can be achieved is through multilingualism. The ideal situation is that we should all speak at least three or four different languages, especially since as children, we can effortlessly pick up any number of languages, the only limit being that we would be able to speak only those languages spoken to us in infancy. Whilst it is true that this is desirable from a social point of view, it is also desirable from a purely personal point of view. Ongoing studies suggest that the ability to speak several different languages not only improves individual confidence but also has the capacity to protect the brain from dementia and other such conditions as old age sets in. For the overwhelming majority of educated Nigerians, this is good news as they have at least two languages in their locker. As things stand, they at least speak their local language as well as English.

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Our ability to speak English is a fall out of our colonial past. In the nineteenth century as Europeans began their incursion into Africa, it was soon clear that the ability to speak the language of those interlopers was the source of a distinct advantage to those who could speak the newly grafted language. It made it possible for such people to be pulled into the orbit of the colonizers and in doing so becoming intermediaries between the colonizers and the indigenous peoples. At that time, the colonies were sorely dependent on commercial activities. They all provided a source of income and those intermediaries were able to create a profitable niche for themselves sometimes to the detriment of those on the other side of the language barrier. The situation has hardly changed since then and there are no signs of any impending change. On the other hand, many of those who have since gone through the educational system are determined to confer some advantage on their children by restricting them to the mastering of the English language in order for them to land elite jobs and propagate the method of recruitment into the upper classes.

English is the official language of Nigeria as well as more than eighty countries in the world. This is because there was a time when more than a quarter of the world was under British colonial rule. That was a time when it was said that the sun never set on the British empire. Now that the sun has finally set on that empire in every sense of the world, the British have left their language as an unforgettable souvenir in all those countries and more because Rwanda and Burundi which were never colonised by the British have adopted English as their official language. In addition to all those countries which were once British colonies, the United States of America is an English speaking territory but even then it is worth remembering that the original states of the union were English colonies and as they expanded to cover fifty states, the English language also spread to cover all the states and so, of the two billion English speakers all over the world, close to 350 million of them are Americans and it may even be said that the continued influence of the English language is due to the cultural domination of the global space by American institutions. The world is kept entertained and acculturated by films made in Hollywood. The language of American technology which stands increasingly dominant is English and this technology is exploited the world over. We are all in the grip of social media and without a working knowledge of the English language, one is quickly left out of the loop and so, all over the world, people have English as their second language. For a lot of us therefore, having English as a second language as we do expedites the japa syndrome which gives us the valuable option of packing up and going away to another country. One is actually spoilt for choice as to where to relocate to. The one downside is that the situation we are in has become a threat to our local languages and the danger to language diversity all over the world looms increasingly large on the global horizon.

December 7, 2025
Femi Fani-Kayode’s ambassadorial nomination

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s announcement of ambassadorial nominations on 29 November, 2025 have produced a harvest of words. A calm look at the overabundance of comments and criticisms on the nominations yields a very clear understanding of what is meant by the ‘Dunning-Kruger Effect’.

According to psychologist Kendra Cherry, “the Dunning-Kruger effect is when people overestimate their skills because they don’t know enough to see their own lack of knowledge or ability.” Cherry illustrates the Dunning-Kruger Effect with the following commonplace dinner table situation at a holiday family gathering: “Throughout the meal, a member of your extended family spouts off on a topic at length, boldly proclaiming that they are correct and that everyone else’s opinion is stupid, uninformed, and just plain wrong. While it may be evident that this person has no idea what they are talking about, they prattle on, blithely oblivious to their ignorance.”

Just like this prattling family member and seemingly oblivious of the Yoruba proverbial counsel that many words do not fill a basket, all manner of commentators or critics have spoken extensively and passionately about the ambassadorial nominations. One of the non-career names on the list who has received particularly negative attention is Chief Femi Fani-Kayode who is an articulate lawyer, a former spokesperson to former President Olusegun Obasanjo of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and is also a former Minister of Aviation in the same administration.

On 20 August, 2020, he called a Daily Trust journalist, Eyo Charles, “stupid” in Calabar, because the reporter asked him who was bankrolling his unofficial assessment tours of several southern state governments in Nigeria. Specifically, as the 26 August, 2020 issue of Daily Times Nigeria reported, Fani-Kayode responded: “What type of stupid question is that? Bankrolling who? Do you know who you are talking to? … What type of insulting question is that? Which bankroll? … Please don’t insult me here. … I could see from your face before you got here, how stupid you are … You have a small mind, very small mind. Don’t judge me by your own standards.”

Fani-Kayode was further reported to have said to his audience: “I’m sorry, that was deeply insulting. I don’t often get annoyed in press conferences. I’ve been doing this kind of thing for very many, many years. … Bankroll who? … Don’t ever try that with me again o. Don’t, please. … I have a very short fuse.” The former presidential spokesperson was widely condemned for this outburst.

In response, in the same 26 August, 2020 issue of Daily Times Nigeria, Fani-Kayode was reported to have apologised as follows: “I met with my advisors till late last night and I wish to say the following. I hereby withdraw the word ‘stupid’ which I used in my encounter with a journalist in Calabar. I have many friends in the media whom I offended by losing my cool and using such words. I hereby express my regrets for doing so.”

Considering the tendency by some Nigerians to see anything they believe to be wrong as peculiarly Nigerian and incapable of happening in ‘saner climes’, Fani-Kayode must have been in comfortable company, as shown in a 28 November, 2025 PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) News YouTube video titled “WATCH: ‘Are you stupid?’ Trump rebuffs reporter’s question on Afghan resettlement vetting.”

In the video of a 27 November, 2025 interview, a CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System) reporter, Nancy Cordes, tried to deflect Trump’s castigation of the Joe Biden administration’s lack of vetting and checking of immigrants for allowing the entry into the United States of the Afghan man suspected of shooting two members of the United States National Guard on 26 November, 2025, in Washington, DC. Nancy Cordes noted: “Your DOJ IG [Department of Justice Inspector General] just reported this year that there was thorough vetting by DHS [Department of Homeland Security] and by the FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigation] of these Afghans who were brought into the U.S. So, why do you blame the Biden administration?”

To this attempt to correct him, Trump interrupted her and said angrily: “Because they let them in. Are you stupid? Are you a stupid person? Because they came in on a plane along with thousands of other people that shouldn’t be here. And you’re just asking questions because you’re a stupid person.” The difference between the Fani-Kayode and Trump outbursts is that while the former Nigerian minister expressed regret and apologised for calling a journalist ‘stupid’, the American president showed no remorse.

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Opponents of Fani-Kayode’s nomination as ambassador discountenance his apologies and his claim that “I don’t often get annoyed in press conferences. I’ve been doing this kind of thing for very many, many years.” They also disregard his politeness to the other members of his audience when he said, “I’m sorry, that was deeply insulting.” Moreover, they ignore his statement that he was withdrawing the offensive word to assuage the feelings of his media friends. In fact, his detractors argue unforgivingly that his reaction to the Daily Trust reporter was evidence of the fact that he did not possess the temperament suitable for the efficient performance of the duties of an ambassador.

Those who are against Fani-Kayode’s nomination as an ambassador also refer to previous statements in which he had castigated Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu with respect to the nomination of Professor Yemi Osinbajo as vice-presidential candidate to then-candidate Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC). In one of those statements during the PDP campaigns for the presidential elections, Fani-Kayode was shown on video to have said: “Senator Tinubu … is desperate to be president for his own selfish reasons.”

However, as the Director, New Media of the Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Council, Femi Fani-Kayode said about candidate Tinubu in a 7 January, 2023 YouTube video of a TVC news interview titled, “Tinubu has distinctive policies for Nigerians”: “He’s the only man that’s truly sincere about moving this country forward. He wants power for the people. He wants electricity to be generated throughout the country. He has distinct policies that he wants to establish.”

Moreover, Fani-Kayode was accused of inconsistency for refuting the claim of exclusive ‘Christians genocide’ in Nigeria. To this, he said in a 4 October, 2025 article titled, “The fiction of Christian genocide and the conspiracy against Nigeria,” on his website femifanikayode.org: “A number of years ago I was amongst those that erroneously believed that only Christians were being targetted and subjected to genocide by the terrorists in Nigeria. This was the case until 2020 when I went on a tour of the North West and North East and discovered that as many, if not more, Muslims and Muslim communities had been targetted and subjected to mass murder, ethnic cleansing and genocide as the Christian ones in that area.”

Fani-Kayode continued: “What I witnessed in Zamfara, Sokoto, Katsina, Kaduna, Yobe, Borno, Bauchi, Adamawa, Gombe and other parts of the majority Muslim core North shocked and shattered me and constrained me to accept the assertion that this was not an onslaught against Christians and Christian communities alone but rather an attack on Nigerians of every faith. … From the day I came to appreciate all this I took an oath before God and man that I would speak out against the atrocities being perpetuated against not just Christians but also Muslims. I also accepted the fact that to do anything other than that would not only be inherently intellectually dishonest but also would add to the problem and make it worse rather than solve it.”

Incidentally, his new views about the non-existence of exclusive ‘Christian genocide’ in Nigeria align with those of the Benue State Governor Hyacinth Alia who is a Catholic priest, Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese Most Reverend Father Matthew Hassan Kukah, the Chairman of the Borno State Branch of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), and above all, the Federal Government of Nigeria. So, how does this agreement constitute a ground for disqualifying him as an ambassadorial nominee? Indeed, he has also written extensively and powerfully in support of Nigeria’s position on the Israeli carnage in Gaza.

Regarding what is perceived as the inconsistency of Fani-Kayode, people seem to be judging him by standards harsher than the ones with which they judge themselves. In fact, who has not had cause to change their own position before? One common principle is that the only permanent thing in life is change. A related Yoruba musical proverb says: “T’órin bá ti yí, k’ílù yípadà” (‘Once the song changes, the accompanying drumming changes.’) Moreover, what is called inconsistency in some social contexts is called flexibility in politics. And in politics, flexibility is not a vice.

In any case, who is to be preferred? One who had been a beneficiary of your generosity and large-heartedness in the past, had praised you to high heavens, and had told the whole world you were uniquely primed to be Nigeria’s president, but, when you strove for the high office, told the world how unsuitable you were for that office? Or one who worked for you to get to office, and then, due to impatience with the pace or nature of your reward system goes all out to bring you down? Or the person who first worked against you when you were striving to get to office, but who, in the midst of the struggle, had cause to change their views about you, and so supported your efforts during the campaigns and has gone the extra length to make you succeed in office?

Should President Tinubu have thrown the baby away with the bath water? And should those now charged with screening Chief Femi Fani-Kayode for suitability as Nigeria’s ambassador discountenance his current value? One Rasheed Oniyangi, on Facebook, on 30 November, 2025, recalled this President Tinubu quote: “I plan for betrayal, I plan for backstabbing, I also plan for reunion and forgiveness long before they happen. In life, I expect nothing, I expect anything, I expect everything.” Why then do the critics of Fani-Kayode’s nomination take it upon themselves to cry more than the bereaved?

In line with the principle that all actions shall be judged by intention, the opposition to Femi Fani-Kayode’s ambassadorial nomination raises a number of questions. Are the opponents of the nomination driven by goodwill to President Tinubu? Are they driven by ill-will and the desire to denude the president of the stout support this nominee has been giving him and the government? Are the opponents driven by the desire to penalise and discomfit the nominee for unabashedly supporting a president the detractors would rather see fail?

Consider this 1 December, 2025 quote from “Deep Shallow Dive Podcast” on Facebook titled, “Hard Truth Time”: “Maybe it’s time we stop letting the loudest, angriest voices write the script.”

December 7, 2025
Steady hands in a restless season

In a week when the nation trembled under the weight of coordinated attacks and cynical assaults on its peace, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu once again returned to the core of statecraft: security. The week unfolded not with noise or drama but with quiet, decisive movements, movements that revealed a President tightening the bolts of Nigeria’s security architecture with deliberate speed and unwavering focus.

For a country still absorbing the shock of recent mass abductions in Kebbi, Kwara, Niger and other vulnerable corridors, last week became the clearest demonstration yet that the Commander-in-Chief is keeping steady hands on the nation’s wheel, restructuring from the top, energising the chain of command, and signalling unmistakably that the season of hesitation is over.

On Monday evening, at about 7:03 p.m., former Chief of Defense Staff, General Christopher Gwabin Musa (rtd.), arrived at the State House for a closed-door meeting with the President. It was his first appearance at the Villa since his retirement in October. No official disclosed the agenda. No aide gave background hints. But to those who follow the pulse of national security, the timing and the personality involved suggested the beginning of something consequential.

Tinubu does not summon a recently retired CDS at night unless the security calculus is shifting. And within hours of that quiet meeting, the shift became public: Minister of Defense Mohammed Badaru resigned, citing health reasons. The President accepted the resignation immediately, thanked him for his service, and signalled the imminence of a major reset in the nation’s security leadership.

By Tuesday morning, the reset was fully in motion. The President forwarded the name of General Musa to the Senate as his choice for the new Minister of Defense. Within hours, on Wednesday, the Senate commenced screening and after about five hours, confirmation was complete. And on Thursday morning, the retired general was sworn in.

A three-day transition, unprecedented in speed, signalled two things: that the President was moving with intention, and that the task of stabilising the nation’s defense architecture could no longer wait for the luxury of long bureaucratic rhythms. In a period defined by coordinated attacks and the abduction of schoolgirls and worshippers, delay had become a risk no responsible leader would take.

President Tinubu captured the urgency in a brief message on X, thanking the Senate and emphasising that General Musa’s appointment came “at a critical juncture in our lives as a Nation.” And indeed, critical hardly begins to describe the complexity of the security challenges unfolding across multiple fronts.

But if the Musa appointment was about leadership renewal, the President’s actions on Tuesday afternoon were about operational direction. In a meeting that lasted more than an hour, Tinubu sat with the nation’s service chiefs and heads of intelligence agencies, issuing fresh directives and demanding new approaches to strategy execution.

Those in attendance included NSA Nuhu Ribadu; DSS DG Oluwatosin Ajayi; NIA DG Mohammed Mohammed; CDS General Olufemi Oluyede; Defence Intelligence chief Lt.-Gen. Emmanuel Undiadeye; the Army, Navy and Air Force chiefs.

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The President’s instructions were clear: greater efficiency, stronger coordination, improved execution, and measurable results. With the yuletide fast approaching, a period criminal elements historically exploit, the Commander-in-Chief was insisting on tighter responses and smarter deployments. The meeting was also the latest in a chain of engagements following his earlier declaration of a nationwide security emergency.

And yet, in the midst of firefighting, the President still found room to speak to the heart of the military institution. At the launch of the 2026 Armed Forces Remembrance Day emblem, he shifted the national conversation from fear to honour, from the anxiety of the moment to the duty owed to those who stand between the nation and chaos.

The President reminded the nation that as insecurity mounts, the military continues to absorb the heaviest blows on behalf of ordinary citizens. “As a grateful nation, we must honour the fallen, support the wounded, and care for all who answered the call to serve,” he said.

Even more significant was his admonition against divisive rhetoric. In a season of fear and suspicion, Tinubu insisted that Nigeria’s diversity remained a strength, not a fracture point. Unity, he reminded Nigerians, is not only a moral imperative but a security requirement.

He highlighted ongoing reforms: enhanced allowances, upgraded barracks, strengthened healthcare systems, expansion of Defense Health Maintenance Services Limited, and the modernisation of pension verification processes. He pointed to operational gains: tens of thousands of insurgents surrendered, key terrorist leaders neutralised, and several captives freed. In the maritime domain, piracy and oil theft have been drastically curtailed, with new naval platforms deployed to secure the waterways.

These are incremental but decisive steps in the larger project of rebuilding the nation’s internal defense shield, a project the President identifies as the “central pillar of the Renewed Hope Agenda”.

Indeed, the events of last week revealed a President governing through turbulence with a steady hand. The overnight transition in defense leadership, the direct engagement with the security high command, and the reaffirmation of military morale at the Remembrance Day emblem launch all pointed to a leader refusing to surrender initiative to circumstances.

A week that began with a silent 7 p.m. visit ended with a restructured Defense Ministry, a rebriefed security command, and a reaffirmed national commitment to unity, sacrifice and shared responsibility. There were no theatrics. No exaggerated promises. Just deliberate movements, step by step, towards restoring peace in a country that has long been buffeted by forces seeking to tear it apart.

And perhaps that is the quiet lesson: sustainable security is not built on dramatic announcements but on a chain of actions, decisions and recalibrations, each reinforcing the next. Last week, Tinubu took several of those steps, binding them into a broader strategy aimed at securing the land and reassuring its people.

Nigeria may be going through a restless season, but it is also in a season of reconstruction, one that requires firmness, patience, and clarity of purpose. For now, the President has shown that he is not simply responding to events; he is shaping them, pushing back against the tides, and holding the line for a safer nation. In moments like this, leadership is not measured by applause but by steadiness. And last week, the steadiness was unmistakable.

If last week was dominated by the rapid recalibration of the nation’s security architecture, President Tinubu did not allow that singular priority to eclipse other pillars essential to keeping the ship of state on course. Even in a week defined by urgency in the defense sector, the President maintained his characteristic breadth of governance, moving decisively across institutions, economic planning, diplomacy, and national cohesion. The most consequential of these non-security actions emerged on Wednesday, when the Federal Executive Council approved the 2026–2028 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper, a document that will shape Nigeria’s fiscal direction for the next three years.

The approval, which came during a session presided over by the President, provided both a roadmap and a message. It signalled that while the administration battles insecurity with unrelenting focus, it has not taken its eyes off the structural economic reforms required to stabilise the nation’s finances and restore long-term prosperity. According to Ministers Atiku Bagudu and Wale Edun, who briefed after the meeting, the MTEF projects ₦50.7 trillion in revenue for 2026, anchored on improved non-oil earnings, stronger tax administration, and more disciplined public spending. The Council adopted an oil production benchmark of 2.06 million barrels per day and an oil price benchmark of $64 per barrel, alongside a projected exchange rate of ₦1,512 to the dollar.

The President, the ministers revealed, welcomed the MTEF’s direction but insisted that the economy must grow at a faster pace to meet his administration’s ambitions. He directed MDAs to channel capital spending strictly into growth-enhancing and job-creating programmes, underlining his determination to extract real results from government investments. The Council also approved two important financing windows, an AfDB-backed $100 million fund for youth entrepreneurs and an Islamic Development Bank financing package for agricultural expansion in Yobe State.

But governance last week did not begin on Wednesday. On Monday, President Tinubu celebrated Professor Jerry Gana at 80, describing him as one of Nigeria’s most enduring public servants whose contributions marked several eras of national development. The same day, he received Taraba Governor Agbu Kefas, his first visit since defecting to the APC, signalling continuing political realignments across the country.

On Tuesday, the President hosted Governor Alex Otti, who was believed to have met him as part of ongoing efforts to secure the release of jailed leader of the proscribed IPOB, Nnamdi Kanu. Even as security agencies intensify operations nationwide, Tinubu has kept political dialogue open, reflecting his multi-track approach to national stability.

Wednesday began with the swearing-in of five new Permanent Secretaries and the Chairman of the National Population Commission, Aminu Yusuf, ahead of the FEC meeting. The ceremony expanded the administrative backbone required to implement national policy efficiently.

By Thursday, the President had shifted to diplomacy, receiving letters of credence from 21 new envoys and reaffirming Nigeria’s commitment to global peace, cooperation, and shared prosperity. The day also saw him pay tribute to two remarkable Nigerians; industrialist Samuel Adedoyin at 90 and nationalist Tanko Yakasai at 100, both reminders of the country’s deep reservoirs of service, sacrifice, and enterprise.

The week closed with the President celebrating Senator Wole Fadeyi’s traditional title from the Ooni of Ife, inaugurating governing boards for NADF, BOA and UBEC, and holding a private meeting with Aliko Dangote, further evidence of a Presidency deeply engaged across sectors.

Though dominated by security reforms, last week ultimately reflected the full breadth of Tinubu’s governance: stabilising the economy, strengthening institutions, deepening diplomacy, and celebrating national icons, all while confronting the country’s most pressing threats, President steering the ship on every front.

December 7, 2025
Panic school closures

Responding to the rash (or what grammarians call a deliberate concatenation) of abductions orchestrated to raise Nigeria’s political temperature to boiling point, the federal and some state governments have hastily shut down some of their schools. It was a panic measure evidently ill-conceived. In the estimation of the fidgeting governments, they would rather be safe than sorry. But what happens to uncovered syllabuses? Would students of those schools not be disadvantaged against their counterparts in schools with unbroken calendar? While states shut down fewer schools, the federal government shut down more than three dozen Unity Colleges. The immediate impact of those massive shutdowns was to send the populace reeling, as if the whole country was besieged and helpless.

But beyond the shutdowns and the hysteria, the governments’ response sent an awkward message of impotence to the rest of the country and the world. At a time when boldness and risk-taking were in great demand, the governments had responded by retreating into their shells. It was a time to think on their feet, reason extraordinarily, quickly restructure their security systems, and make deployments capable of providing rapid response to abductions and attacks even in far-flung places. The question to ask is: should attacks continue instead of considerably abating, would the schools be kept on permanent shutdown? The holiday seasons are upon the country; it is, therefore, unclear whether the shut schools would be opened before the end of the year.

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The governments had advanced warnings of school attacks and abductions, for these crimes never stopped in the first instance. There was really no concise and coherent plan to provide deterrence for schools susceptible to attacks. Hopefully, the right lessons have been learnt from the Kebbi and Niger States school attacks, not to say the foiled attack on a school in Kogi State. Instead of retreating endlessly and yielding ground to bandits and terrorists, it may be time to develop a powerful homegrown solution to tackle the crisis.

November 30, 2025
PDP’s gaffe-prone factional chairman

After a faction of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) unanimously affirmed him as national chairman, it took only a few days for Kabiru Turaki to kick-start his career as a gaffe machine of the most exquisite variety. Speaking in Abuja two Tuesdays ago when he led his ‘troops’ to forcibly repossess the party’s national headquarters, and had been tear-gassed in the process together with his ‘brigade commanders’, he shouted himself hoarse in the cause of, as he put it facetiously, democracy. Now, he has again put his foot in his mouth over what he believed was the Federal High Court, Abuja’s predisposition to truncate justice. At the rate he is going, especially given his fecundity, he will likely sustain a weekly production of gaffes until early next year when his faction will conduct their own PDP primaries.

Former vice president Atiku Abubakar used to be the leading melodramatic politician in the elite category. Now, he clearly cannot hold a candle to Alhaji Turaki, a combative senior lawyer who is neither diplomatic nor conciliatory. How both would have fared had Alhaji Atiku not defected to the fringe African Democratic Congress (ADC) is unclear; but a fierce competition to determine who could run his mouth the wildest would probably have ensued. Well, that’s a moot point now. The former vice president has taken his talent for wild and fanciful summations to the ADC, and Alhaji Turaki has the coast cleared for him to calumniate as much as his lexical resources can carry him.

On November 18, after inhaling a little teargas during the battle for the party headquarters, his wits addled, Alhaji Turaki cried out to probably the most undemocratic president in United States history to help save or restore Nigerian democracy. He was remorseless: “I want to call on President Trump to come and help save democracy in Nigeria. It is not only genocide against Christians that is happening. He should come and save democracy in Nigeria because democracy is under threat. I am calling on other developed nations to come and save democracy in Nigeria…I have said that we are willing to lay down our lives to protect our office, to protect our democracy and to protect our mandate. Nigerians, you are seeing what is happening. The international community, you are seeing the threat that Nigerian democracy is facing. Come and save us.” He ignored his Freudian slip of confirming Christian genocide in Nigeria and goes on to cry mournfully for help. That help will of course never come. The American president does not just resent democracy, he loathes it, and is fascinated by right-wing, authoritarian and even fascist leaders.

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Alhaji Turaki’s gaffes sound eerily like morbid humour to most Nigerians. But to the PDP leader, it probably sounds like music. Roundly condemned and mocked for calling for help from the US, he nevertheless caused a letter to be written to the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court, Abuja, to complain of juridic bias against his party. According to him, a sinister coincidence pervades the administration of justice in the court, and a conspiracy in assigning PDP suits to generally a trio of judges hell bent on disinheriting the opposition party. Hear him: “My lord, it is of great concern to our Party that it would appear that all matters for the past few years filed in the Federal High Court, Abuja Judicial Division either for or against our Party have always been assigned to the following three Judges only, namely: Hon. Justice James Omotosho; Hon. Justice Peter Odo Lifu; Hon. Justice Abdulmalik. Even though there are other Judges numbering up to nine in the Abuja Judicial Division, who could have taken up any of these matters, as the Abuja Division has 12 Judges. Several of our Party members have recently complained bitterly to the newly elected members of the National Working Committee and the National Executive Committee of the above-mentioned scenario. Indeed, all these three Courts are viewed by party members and indeed the public as ‘courts of particular concern’ with regard to matters pertaining to or affecting the interest of the Peoples Democratic Party…”

The court will respond to the allegations, but it is not clear whether a copy of that response will be circulated to the media, assuming the PDP does not leak it. But it is interesting that Alhaji Turaki punned the three suspected courts as ‘courts of particular concern’, an indication that the new factional chairman is simply fooling around with activism, perhaps his secret fantasy. It is also significant that while he talked about the coincidence of case assignment, he was less enthusiastic about talking about the jurisprudential exactitude of the suits his party repeatedly lost. For a factional party chairman who was accused of ignoring court judgements and engaging in forum shopping, it is indeed passing strange that he claims to be fighting for democracy and the rule of law, unfazed by his boyish invitation that opens the nation’s doors for disreputable outsiders to meddle in Nigerian affairs. When, sir, is your next gaffe due?

November 30, 2025
VIPs also cry

President Tinubu’s withdrawal of their police security men does not seem to go down well with them. But will the order stand this time?

Last Sunday, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu ordered the withdrawal of police officers currently providing security for Very Important Persons (VIPs) in the country, to boost the number of personnel, as well as enable them concentrate on their core police duties.

The directive was issued at the security meeting the president held with the Chief of Army Staff, Lt General Waidi Shaibu; the Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Sunday Kelvin Aneke; the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun; and the Director-General of the Department of State Services (DSS), Tosin Adeola Ajayi, in Abuja.

Henceforth, VIPs who want police protection will now request well-armed personnel from the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC).

Before the ink with which the presidential spokesman, Bayo Onanuga, wrote his press release on the matter dried up, reports say some of the affected VIPs had been inundating police headquarters with calls seeking more clarifications over the development and expressing fears, based on the prevailing security situation in the country.

The major concern of these VIPs is whether the NSCDC has the capacity to protect them, considering their training and requirements. “He (a VIP) told us that it will be like engaging Boys Scouts to protect them as the mobile policemen they normally engage are more agile and battle-ready to confront any situation.”

Another VIP told Vanguard: “The practice of providing police escorts to high ranking officers and VIP’s has become a major feature of the security landscape in Nigeria, but it must be noted that as the country grapples with growing security concerns, the use of police personnel for VIP protection has raised significant questions about its broader implications on public safety and the overall effectiveness of the police force.”

This VIP would even seem more considerate, considering the attempt he made to strike a balance between public safety and individual safety. So, rather than the blanket ban or withdrawal that could lead to increase in the prevailing fears of insecurity, he called for rationalisation of the exercise.

“The justification behind this practice often rests on the high-profile nature of individuals involved, the perceived threat to their safety, and the desire to project power and influence.

”While these measures are meant to offer security for influential figures, the broader implication is that they come at a high cost to the public, both in terms of the security resources diverted and the moral perception of a system that favours the few over the many,” he said.

Fair argument, if you ask me.

But, we should have expected the big people affected by the directive to react the way some of them did. Nigeria’s big men do not want to lose any privilege. After all, this is not the first time that such order for the withdrawal of policemen serving VIPs would be made. In the last 20 years or so, there has not been an inspector-general of police that did not issue such directive.

As far back as 2003, the then IGP, Mustafa Adebayo Balogun initiated one of the earliest major attempts to withdraw police orderlies from judicial officers and politicians nationwide, essentially to prevent abuse of the police officers.

Ogbonnaya Onovo, who succeeded Balogun, in August 2009 issued a sweeping order mandating all police personnel serving as private orderlies to return to their bases. This directive extended to former heads of state, ministers, legislators, and governors. Onovo gave a seven-day deadline for the order to be complied with. He said he was disturbed by the degradation of police professionalism caused by officers performing menial tasks such as carrying handbags or opening doors for VIPs. As at that time, there were 100,000 such policemen attached to the VIPs.

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Then Hafiz Ringim, who succeeded Onovo. He reinforced the withdrawal policy by cautioning officers guarding unauthorised individuals to return to their commands or face arrest and prosecution. To underscore his seriousness on the issue, he established a special monitoring unit to ensure adherence to the directive, signalling a more rigorous enforcement approach.

Then Mohammed Abubakar, Solomon Arase, Ibrahim Idris, Mohammed Adamu, Usman Alkali Baba, and Kayode Egbetokun, the incumbent Inspector-General of Police who had also repeated the same ritual. That it had to take President Tinubu to personally make the order this time around means that he also appreciated the need for such an order to come from the seat of power.

The thing is; in all the cases, the big people have always complained and their police security men restored.

So, I saw the silence-enough-to-be heard protest coming. I knew that the big men would kick against the presidential order even before the ink used to pen the press release on it dried up. Nigeria’s big men do not want to lose any privilege, no matter how obnoxious. And they have a surfeit of them. Otherwise, how do you explain that in a country of over 220 million citizens being served by about 370,000 policemen, more than a third of the number was allocated to VIPs?

Are such people fair to Nigerians? Do they have two heads? And are the other Nigerians who had to be deprived so the VIPs could breathe not entitled to police protection? Is it not the same one life that the VIPs have that the ordinary Nigerians too have?

Although some would make the point that it is not all about numbers; but numbers also matter. Freeing a whopping 100,000 policemen to complement those on the field should definitely make some impact on the terrible security situation in the country. The United States, for instance, protects its 341 million population with about 750,000-strong law enforcement officers. This is an average of one policeman to about 455 persons.

Nigeria’s population is about 232.6 million and it is being served by about 270,000 policemen (less the 100,000 others assigned as security to VIPs). This is a ratio of about 1:859 persons. With this, it is clear that Nigeria is disadvantaged and underserved in virtually every policing index unlike the U.S. that has the advantage of technology to leverage in terms of internal security. So, if we are able to free about 100,000 policemen to join the 270,000 that are presently doing strictly policing, the ratio would increase to 1: 600. Other things being equal, this should reflect in effectiveness and efficiency.

The fact of the matter is that, in Nigeria, virtually everything under the sun is a status symbol. I remember when the global system for mobile (GSM) communication phones came into the country in 2001, you would see some of our big men trying to pause one call for another in the open, to show off the number of telephones they owned, courtesy of GSM. Some of them even engaged personal assistants essentially for the purpose of carrying the phones for them. GSM telephones then were status symbols.

When we see policemen guiding many of our VIPs, we know it is not only about security; it is also a status symbol. It is something to let the community know that one has arrived, or that levels have changed. That is not all. Many at times, some of these policemen help their new ‘masters’ fight personal battles, that is when they are not turned to errand boys by not only ‘oga at the top’, but ,madam at the bottom,, and the kids as well.

And they do these errand boy jobs even better and gladly than the professionals because of the extra bucks that such jobs fetch them. Obviously, their miserable take-home pay cannot take them home.

For Nigeria, this is not the best of times to over-pamper a select few at the expense of the generality of the people. The country is at war with terrorists and we need all hands on deck to win the war.

So, am I now saying that some Nigerians do not deserve extra protection even by the very nature of their public assignments? NO! For most rules, there are exceptions. We cannot say, for example, that our judges should be left to their own devices. There are other categories of public officials who require police protection; they should be accorded the privilege. Others may, as the president rightly suggested, look toward the NSCDC for cover.

But, the government should work out, on a sustainable basis, the number of policemen to recruit annually to reduce the manpower shortage in the force. The then President Olusegun Obasanjo had in 2000 ordered the police force to begin an annual recruitment of some 40,000 men for four years to bridge the gap. I do not know if this was followed throughout his eight years in office, and even subsequently. This cannot be the spirit in a country with serious security situation like ours. The recruitment and training should be regular and sustained until such a time when we know that we already have enough or close to enough.

The fact is: we have been too lackadaisical about security. That explains why we could have abandoned the police force for so long. Now that we are facing the stark reality of that neglect, the very people who should have done something about the situation are the ones crying for special protection; a thing that had always blinded them to the reality on ground. What I am saying is that our big men, particularly those who are in position to make a difference to our lives should not continue to live in the illusion that all is well when that is far from being correct. When they are given police protection, they cannot understand when the hoi polloi say there is insecurity in the land. I learnt many politicians of northern extraction cannot go to their towns and villages due to insecurity. When they also have a feel of what the ordinary people see and feel daily on insecurity, they would realise the mistake they have made over the decades by leaving the country under-policed. And not only under-policed, but under-paid, poorly kitted, ill-trained, ill-accommodated and ill-motivated. All the ‘ills’ are present in the Nigeria Police Force! We must be prepared to address them if we are to sleep with our two eyes closed.

It is ungodly and inhuman for a country that is battling terrorism, mass abductions and violent crimes to reserve 100,000 policemen to protect probably less than 250,000 Nigerians while 270,000 others are protecting the majority 230 million. It is absolutely absurd.

What, in my view, the president can do is try to give a three-month period within which to allow for the training of the NSCDC personnel that would take over VIP protection from the police. Henceforth, VIP protection should be a permanent feature of their training.

Then the salaries of all the security personnel must be reviewed, as well as their condition of service, to make their job attractive and enhance their performance.

This would appear the first time that such directive on police withdrawal from VIPs would be coming from an incumbent president. That being the case, it is expected that there should be a difference in implementation this time around. Normally, when a president speaks, it is like an oracle has spoken and I believe President Tinubu understands this.

Meanwhile, where is State Police in all of these?

November 30, 2025