WE SAY NO to Kings written by Kio Amachree SKJ Records 2025 (Verse 1) We say no to Kings, we say no to would-be Caesars We say no to Kings, we say no to third-rate convicted grifters How can a man with a permanent suntan think he should be sitting on a throne? Stick a fish bone down his throat, do him a favor, put him out of his misery (Chorus) We say no to Kings, we say no to would-be Caesars We say no to Kings, we say no to third-rate convicted grifters Democracy is sacred, as is the constitution Democracy is our birthright — we say no to Kings (Verse 2) A third-class fat slob, incompetent, wants to wear the crown of America He was too scared to fight for his country, but when it comes to corruption and money He enriches himself and his crime family — we see him for what he is (Chorus) We say no to Kings, we say no to would-be Caesars We say no to Kings, we say no to third-rate convicted grifters Democracy is sacred, as is the constitution Democracy is our birthright — we say no to Kings (Bridge) No six-time bankrupt, Hitler-loving slob will sit upon that throne He’s out of his mind and so are his enablers We say hell no to Kings, we say hell no to would-be Caesars We say freedom for our children’s children — the rule of law forever (Chorus — full) We say no to Kings, we say no to would-be Caesars We say no to Kings, we say no to third-rate convicted grifters Democracy is sacred, as is the constitution Democracy is our birthright — we say no to Kings (Outro) We say hell no to Kings — freedom and law forever. #Hashtags #Democracy #RuleOfLaw #NoToKings #Freedom #SayNo

LETTERS FROM STOCKHOLM TINUBU AND HIS ENABLERS HAVE GONE TOO FAR. NIGERIA CANNOT CONTINUE LIKE THIS. By Kio Amachree 27 October 2026 It is getting to the point where I will soon advise the Nigerian people to withdraw their political consent from the Tinubu regime and to regard him and his enablers as enemies of everything a democratic Nigerian state is supposed to stand for. The contempt coming from this man, his family and his political associates is simply too much to stomach anymore. Laws are broken. The Constitution is treated as an inconvenience. The police and the security services are misused. The institutions built to protect Nigerians are being turned against the very people they exist to serve. As I wrote the other week, I regard the APC not as a political party but as an organisation whose conduct raises serious questions of criminality, abuse of power and institutional corruption. Its leaders behave as if winning an election placed them above accountability. That belief is the most dangerous thing in Nigeria today. I have studied political history long enough to recognise the danger of a political organisation becoming indistinguishable from the state. The judges at Nuremberg established that individuals remain accountable for crimes committed under the protection of political authority. I am not saying Nigeria is Nazi Germany. I am saying that political office must never become a shield. And before anybody accuses me of exaggerating, let us go through what has actually happened under this administration. Not rumour. Record. THE KILLING OF PROTESTERS In August 2024, Nigerians went onto the streets to protest against hunger, corruption and economic hardship. Amnesty International documented at least 24 people killed by police during the EndBadGovernance demonstrations. More than 1,200 were detained, minors among them. Children were arraigned on treason-related charges and only released after the images of them collapsing in court shamed the government into retreat. Imagine that. Children protesting hunger were treated as threats to the Nigerian state. A year later, Amnesty reported that not one member of the security forces had been prosecuted for those killings. Not one. What sort of government shoots hungry people, charges children with treason, prosecutes nobody, and then lectures Nigerians about democracy and the rule of law? THE SILENCING OF CRITICS Section 39 of the Constitution guarantees freedom of expression. Section 40 guarantees peaceful assembly. Yet journalists, activists and ordinary citizens are arrested or intimidated for criticising those in power, and the Cybercrimes Act has become the weapon of choice against political speech. In 2025, police assaulted journalists covering a peaceful protest in Port Harcourt. The National Broadcasting Commission banned Eedris Abdulkareem’s Tell Your Papa from the airwaves because it mocked the President and his son. I have spent my life in the music business. I have been in the company of artists who sang against presidents and prime ministers and nobody banned them. A government that cannot survive a song is a government that has already lost the argument. THE INSECURITY THEY SAY HAS ENDED My eyes nearly popped out when that lackey of a Senate President claimed that Tinubu had ended insecurity in Nigeria. What country is this man living in? Amnesty International reported in May 2025 that at least 10,217 people had been killed by armed groups in seven states during Tinubu’s first two years in office. Ten thousand, two hundred and seventeen human beings. In seven states only. In June 2025, gunmen slaughtered scores of people in Yelewata, Benue State. Villages are burned, communities displaced, people kidnapped for ransom as a matter of routine. And the Nigerian military, which is supposed to protect civilians, keeps killing them from the air: Human Rights Watch documented airstrikes in 2025, including one in Zamfara in which at least 20 people reportedly died. Where are the inquiries? Where are the prosecutions? Where is the compensation for the families? Section 14(2)(b) of the Constitution says the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government. Not a purpose. The primary purpose. The gunmen pull the triggers, not the President. But a government that fails this primary purpose year after year is politically accountable for that failure, and a Senate President who declares the problem solved while the bodies are still being counted is complicit in the lie. THE RIVERS STATE PRECEDENT In March 2025, Tinubu declared a state of emergency in Rivers State, suspended the elected governor, his deputy and the entire House of Assembly, and installed a retired admiral as sole administrator. Six months later, emergency rule was lifted and the elected officials returned, as if nothing had happened. In December 2025, the Supreme Court dismissed the challenge brought by eleven PDP states, by a majority of six to one. The judgment affirmed the President’s power to declare an emergency and, in the majority’s reading, to suspend elected officials for a limited period. One justice dissented. Eminent lawyers, including Femi Falana, insist the judgment confers no power to remove a governor at all. The lawyers can argue over what the court said. I will say what any citizen can see: a precedent now exists under which a President of Nigeria can displace an elected state government, and the next occupant of Aso Rock will not be shy about using it. Should one man be able to suspend the elected government of a state in a federal democracy? I say no. The Constitution must be amended to say no in plain words, so that no court ever has to guess again. THE HIGHWAY NOBODY TENDERED Now to the money. The Lagos–Calabar Coastal Highway, a project running into trillions of naira, was awarded to Hitech Construction, a company associated with the Chagoury business interests, whose relationship with Tinubu goes back decades. There was no open competitive tender. That is not my allegation. It has been reported for two years and never denied in substance. Questions over procurement approvals, costs, financing, route changes and conflicts of interest remain unanswered. The Public Procurement Act makes competitive bidding the rule. Exceptions exist, but they must be justified and documented. So I ask David Umahi and Bola Tinubu a simple question. Where are the documents showing that this contract was awarded in full compliance with Nigerian law? Publish the contracts. Publish the financing. Publish the cost variations and the approvals. Let independent auditors examine the whole project. If everything is legitimate, what is there to hide? I am not prepared to accept that friendship with the President is a procurement procedure. Nigerians are entitled to proof that it was not. THE PARDONS In October 2025, Tinubu granted clemency to 175 people. The list included convicted drug traffickers, illegal miners, kidnappers and murderers, among them a woman sentenced to death for killing her husband. Amnesty International warned that pardoning people convicted of human rights crimes entrenched impunity and denied victims any hope of justice. The outrage was so loud that the Presidency was forced to revise the list and withdraw clemency from dozens of names. Think about what that tells you. The President of the Federal Republic signed off on a list of drug traffickers and killers without, by his own spokesman’s account, having looked at it properly, and only retreated when Nigerians shouted. That is not leadership. That is a man signing whatever is placed in front of him. Clemency is a constitutional power. Possessing a power does not make every use of it defensible. THE DEBT While all this goes on, the Debt Management Office records Nigeria’s total public debt at roughly 159 trillion naira as of March 2026, against about 87 trillion when Tinubu took office. Exchange rates account for part of that. Borrowing accounts for the rest. The question is not the number. The question is what Nigerians got for it. Where are the hospitals, the schools, the electricity, the safe roads, the secure villages? Why are ordinary Nigerians told to make sacrifices while the political class flies abroad on holiday? THE FOREIGN QUESTION I have repeatedly questioned the relationship between Tinubu and foreign interests, particularly the United States. The documented record is the 1993 civil forfeiture in Chicago, in which Tinubu surrendered funds without any criminal charge or conviction. Beyond that record, it is my personal belief, and I state it as belief and not as fact, that deeper intelligence and political relationships may exist that Nigerians have never been told about. I have even wondered whether Tinubu serves interests that would prefer Nigeria weak and dependent. I cannot prove that and I do not pretend otherwise. But any credible evidence of improper foreign influence over the Nigerian presidency deserves independent investigation, because the alternative explanation for the state of our country is hardly more reassuring: incompetence, patronage and a total absence of accountability. THE ENABLERS The Presidency is not a family business. Nigeria does not belong to Bola Tinubu, his wife, his children, his friends or the APC. It belongs to more than 200 million Nigerians, including the millions who did not vote for him. Where is the National Assembly? Where is the oversight, the investigation, the legislator prepared to challenge Aso Rock instead of applauding it? A Senate that behaves as an extension of the executive has abandoned its democratic function, whatever party its members belong to. The same goes for the judiciary, the police, the DSS and every other institution that exists to serve Nigerians rather than the government of the day. Every official who looks away now should remember that the record is being kept, and that the day of lawful reckoning always comes. 2027 I have said before that the January 2027 election will be a defining moment. If there is credible evidence of manipulation, Nigerians must challenge it through every lawful and peaceful means available. Civil disobedience is a legitimate tradition of peaceful resistance to injustice, and I believe it will become a feature of Nigerian life if the public loses confidence in that election. INEC must understand that Nigerians are entitled to transparent elections and accurate results. Aso Rock must understand that power is not a permanent entitlement. The APC must understand that winning an election does not give any government the right to disregard the Constitution or silence its critics. THE KIO SOLUTION One. An independent judicial inquiry into the August 2024 protest killings, with named officers prosecuted and victims’ families compensated. Two. Publication of every Lagos–Calabar Coastal Highway contract, financing agreement, approval and cost variation, followed by a forensic audit by auditors with no Nigerian political connections. Three. A constitutional amendment to Section 305 stating in plain words that no state of emergency may suspend or remove any elected official. Four. Repeal of the speech provisions of the Cybercrimes Act and enactment of a Dele Giwa Law protecting journalists and critics from politically ordered arrest, detention and torture. Five. The Isabel Precedent: publication of the asset declarations of the President, Vice-President, ministers and governors, and cooperation with foreign authorities in tracing and recovering assets held abroad by Nigerian officials. I am ashamed of what Nigeria has become in the eyes of the world. A country with this much talent, this many resources and this much potential should be leading Africa, not explaining itself. I refuse to accept that Nigerians cannot produce better leaders. There are thousands of competent, honest, patriotic Nigerians who could run this country far better than the people currently in charge. What we lack is not talent. What we lack is a system that rewards it. I have spent much of my life studying governments and the rule of law. I did not spend those years learning about democracy to stay silent while my own country is dragged into institutional decay. I want a Nigeria where the Constitution means something, where public officials can be prosecuted, where the police protect rather than intimidate, where contracts are awarded in the open and where no President, minister, governor or godfather is above the law. Nothing I write is personal. It is politics. Nothing in this article asserts that any person named has been convicted of a crime. Allegations are reported as allegations, court findings as court findings, and my own beliefs as my own beliefs. Those distinctions are what separate accountability from slander, and I keep them deliberately. Tinubu and his enablers must be held to account by constitutional, democratic and peaceful means. Four more years of this would be intolerable. We have already lost too many lives, too much money and too much respect. Enough is enough. Nigeria belongs to Nigerians. Not to Tinubu. Not to his family. Not to the APC. And Nigeria must come first. Kio Amachree President, Worldview International Letters from Stockholm #Tinubu #APC #EndBadGovernance #RiversState #LagosCalabarHighway #Chagoury #NigeriaDecides2027 #TheKioSolution #LettersFromStockholm #NigeriaBelongsToNigerians #KioAmachree Sources: - [Supreme Court Upholds President's Power To Declare Emergency Rule — Channels TV](channelstv.com/2025/12/15/su…) - [Supreme Court confirms Tinubu's power to sack governors — Peoples Gazette](gazettengr.com/?p=431506) - [Fagbemi hails Supreme Court ruling; Falana's contrary reading — Arise TV](arise.tv/fagbemi-hails-supre…) - [Amnesty faults Tinubu's pardons — Channels TV](channelstv.com/2025/10/13/re…) - [Tinubu cancels pardon for drug offenders, kidnappers after outcry — AllAfrica/Premium Times](allafrica.com/stories/202510…)

LETTERS FROM STOCKHOLM BIAFRA, BIGOTRY AND 2027: NIGERIA CANNOT BUILD ITS FUTURE ON INHERITED HATRED By Kio Amachree An Igbo candidate should have to defend his record, his policies and his competence. He should not have to stand trial for Biafra before Nigerians will consider voting for him. That is the question Nigeria must confront as we approach 2027. Will Peter Obi be judged on what he proposes to do for the country, or will some politicians once again exploit ethnicity and religion to prevent a serious discussion about leadership? This is not an endorsement of Obi. Every candidate deserves scrutiny. But scrutiny becomes bigotry when a man’s ancestry is treated as sufficient reason to disqualify him. Anti-Igbo hostility in parts of northern Nigeria has a documented and deeply disturbing history. Yet the North is not one people with one opinion. Its communities, political traditions and religious identities are diverse. Any argument that begins by treating every northerner as an enemy repeats the collective thinking we should be challenging. The historical sequence matters. The anti-Igbo massacres of 1966 preceded Biafra’s declaration of independence in 1967. Scholarship documents how the January coup became interpreted as an Igbo conspiracy and how suspicions of ethnic domination contributed to violence against civilians. We cannot honestly explain all anti-Igbo hostility as a response to separatism when mass violence helped produce the conditions in which separation occurred. Nor did this dangerous thinking disappear with the war. In June 2017, northern youth organisations demanded that Igbo residents leave northern Nigeria. United Nations experts condemned the ultimatum and accompanying messages calling for attacks on Igbo people and their property. These were threats against citizens because of their ethnicity. Professor Ango Abdullahi, speaking as a Northern Elders Forum spokesman, supported the demand and explicitly linked it to Biafran agitation. His position demonstrated how a prominent elder could use separatist politics to justify collective exclusion. But other northern leaders opposed the ultimatum, and consultations involving northern and Igbo representatives helped secure its suspension. The record contains both incitement and resistance to it. We should therefore be precise about older people. Some influential elders have promoted exclusionary positions. That does not establish that older northerners generally hate Igbos, or that younger northerners are automatically more tolerant. I found no reliable comparative survey proving either proposition. Indeed, the 2017 episode involved organisations identifying themselves as youth groups. Age alone will not rescue Nigeria. A younger politician can inherit the prejudices and practices of an older patron. Generational change becomes meaningful when it changes how power is exercised. For Obi, the electoral danger is that legitimate arguments about his record could become entangled with historical suspicion. Opponents could attempt to associate his candidacy with separatism merely because he is Igbo, or present support for him as disloyalty to another community. That is a plausible political risk, rather than a measured prediction of how northern voters will behave. It would also be wrong to explain every northern vote against Obi as ethnic prejudice. Voters can disagree with his economic proposals, question his achievements, prefer another candidate or distrust his political alliances. Those are legitimate democratic judgments. The distinction is whether the argument concerns his fitness for office or assumes that an Igbo person is inherently unfit to hold it. Recent reporting places Obi and Rabiu Kwankwaso together in the Nigeria Democratic Congress’s 2027 presidential campaign. That partnership demonstrates an attempt to build support across regional boundaries. It does not establish that prejudice has disappeared, or that either politician can deliver the automatic loyalty of an entire population. There is another danger: treating prejudice as the only obstacle while neglecting organisation, policy and opposition divisions. Reporting in October describes continuing disagreements over a common opposition ticket. Electoral outcomes will depend on those practical political questions as well as identity. Meanwhile, the urgent questions facing northern communities remain education, livelihoods and physical security. UNICEF-supported research in Katsina, Zamfara and Niger states documents how armed conflict, banditry and community violence disrupt schooling and jeopardise children’s futures. These are concrete failures with consequences that last far beyond an election. A child denied education is not evidence of an inferior people. That child is evidence of an unmet obligation. Poverty is not a cultural destiny. Ignorance is not an inherited northern characteristic. These conditions demand investment, functioning institutions and accountable leadership. The exclusion of young people from meaningful decisions deserves particular attention. Their role in public life should extend beyond campaign crowds and online arguments. Across Nigeria, democratic renewal requires space for younger people to contest office, influence party decisions, scrutinise spending and help shape education and employment policy. But responsibility for fixing these problems cannot simply be transferred to the young. Governors, legislators, ministers, party leaders and public officials already hold power and control resources. They must answer for their performance. We also need honesty about what is sometimes called “orchestrated insecurity”. Persistent violence understandably produces suspicions about complicity, protection and profiteering. However, a claim that particular politicians organise attacks requires specific evidence. Failure to stop insecurity does not, by itself, prove that every incident was deliberately arranged. The proper demand is for independent investigation wherever credible allegations identify sponsors, collaborators or officials obstructing justice. Security expenditure should be scrutinised, victims protected and proven wrongdoing prosecuted. Unanswered questions must lead to investigation rather than harden into unsupported certainty. Ethnic blame offers no solution to these failures. An Igbo neighbour did not become responsible for a missing school budget because a separatist made an inflammatory speech. A Hausa farmer does not become responsible for a politician’s misconduct because they share a language. Ordinary Nigerians should not be made to carry the guilt of powerful people they neither control nor benefit from. The same standard applies to Obi and every other presidential contender: explain how you will protect communities, improve learning, create economic opportunity and make public money accountable. Answer difficult questions. Accept scrutiny. Earn support. Nigeria cannot keep asking its citizens to inherit the quarrels of 1966 while abandoning the obligations of 2026. Biafra must be studied honestly. Bigotry must be challenged wherever it appears. Leadership must be judged by competence, integrity and results. And citizenship must mean that every Nigerian belongs without having to seek permission from an ethnic gatekeeper.

Dangerous Demon in Love written Written by Kio Amachree 2026

THE GROVELLING IS DRAGGING NIGERIAN POLITICS INTO THE GUTTER By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm Peter Obi in the Sultan's palace. Peter Obi at the mosque. Peter Obi waiting his turn in yet another reception room. Watching the pictures, one question would not leave me alone: why does seeking public office in Nigeria require so much grovelling? Why must a man who wants to run the country spend the campaign making other men feel important? I understand the value of meeting people and respecting their customs. What I am tired of is a political culture in which candidates audition for the approval of powerful men instead of presenting themselves for examination by ordinary citizens. I learnt a long time ago that in Nigeria everyone is a big man. Everyone is chairman of the board. Everyone expects recognition, flattery and an elaborate acknowledgment of his importance before you are allowed to get down to business. Bring a serious idea into that room and you will spend half your time nursing wounded egos before anyone asks whether the idea is any good. This is how progressive people get dragged into the gutter. A candidate arrives with a programme and soon finds himself negotiating personalities, observing endless protocol and making promises that will one day compromise his ability to govern. What exactly are we electing a president to do? Manage Nigeria, or spend four years repaying the people who let him into their drawing rooms? My concern is not really Peter Obi. He happens to be the man whose pictures prompted these thoughts. The same questions should be put to every candidate, whatever his party, religion or ethnic background. A Christian can visit a mosque sincerely. A Muslim can visit a church sincerely. Nobody has to abandon his convictions to show respect for another person's faith, and no photograph can tell us what is in a man's heart. But voters are entitled to ask about the theatre. Why must faith become another campaign stage? Why should a candidate feel obliged to perform religious belonging in order to prove he can govern fairly? I want a president whose commitment to Muslims, Christians and everyone else is shown through equal protection, competent government and respect for their rights, and who goes on showing it long after the cameras have gone. The same goes for the traditional institutions. Respecting a ruler's customs is one thing. Allowing political gatekeepers to behave as though they own the votes of everyone in their community is another. A citizen's vote belongs to the citizen. It is not palace property. And beneath all this deference lies a dangerous bargain. If a powerful man believes he delivered your presidency, what will he expect when you arrive? An appointment? A contract? Protection from investigation? The right to telephone you and overrule a minister? A candidate must be able to say, before he takes office: I respect you, but I cannot promise you a share of the government. Otherwise the obligations begin before the oath is sworn. We all know what follows. The candidate who waited patiently in your reception room becomes president and your calls go unanswered. The host feels used. The president resents being reminded of his dependence. What was presented as friendship is exposed as a transaction. And the ordinary voter is still waiting for electricity, security and a hospital that works. What troubles me most is how little room this leaves for serious thought. We need candidates explaining how they will modernise agriculture, fix the schools, attract investment, create jobs and make public institutions function. Instead the attention goes to who received whom, who endorsed whom, who knelt, who bowed and whose ego was properly attended to. There are times when Nigerian politics seems to demand that an educated man use only half his brain. Speak with precision and you are called arrogant. Explain a hard problem honestly and someone tells you ordinary people will not understand. Ordinary Nigerians understand hardship perfectly well. They deserve politicians willing to explain solutions without insulting their intelligence. Accessibility does not require deceit. Humility does not require surrendering your judgment. Respect does not require becoming somebody's political servant. I want candidates who can enter any community with courtesy, speak honestly and leave without having mortgaged their independence. Nigeria needs leaders with the confidence to say what they can deliver, what they cannot and what nobody has the right to demand of them. If a man must spend his whole campaign pretending, flattering and incurring debts he cannot honour, then tell us: on which day does the honest government begin? #Nigeria #Leadership #Accountability #NigerianPolitics #LettersFromStockholm

I AM AN ANGRY DEMOCRAT By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm One of my followers called me a revolutionary the other day. I smiled to myself, because that is about as far from the truth as you can get. I am not a revolutionary. I am a democrat. An angry one. My anger comes from disgust at the status quo. I find the leadership of Nigeria wanting, and what makes it worse is knowing how many Nigerians there are who would make excellent leaders of government and will never be allowed near it. I come from a conservative background, but I have socialist leanings. I do not believe that an accident of birth gives a man the right to the top spot in life. I believe in merit, hard work, education and knowing right from wrong. Whatever your surname, your wealth, your tribe or your connections, you should have to prove that you can do the job. I also believe that a country's wealth should serve its people. Education, healthcare, security and the chance to earn a decent living are the foundations of government, not favours. Nigerians should not have to beg politicians for what their taxes and their national resources ought to provide as a matter of course. But a revolution? In a country as ethnically divided as Nigeria, I do not believe a revolution would work the way some people imagine. What begins in one part of the country would be rejected in another, where people hold different beliefs, answer to different institutions and owe different political loyalties. Anger alone cannot hold such a country together. The military managed sudden changes of government only because it had the guns and the tanks to force its decisions down the throats of the Nigerian people. That is hardly a model we should wish to repeat. I do, however, believe that something drastic must be done to establish true democracy. Holding elections is not enough if those who emerge from them behave as though the country belongs to them, and the institutions meant to restrain them simply fall into line. In my view we are drifting dangerously towards autocracy. When a political system allows a leader to capture power and then dismantle the checks on his authority, Nigerians should question the system itself, not just the man. We cannot keep placing our faith in arrangements that leave us so exposed to abuse. Take the National Assembly. In my opinion it has become a total waste of the enormous resources spent maintaining it. It behaves like a rubber stamp, filled with men and women who seem far more interested in making money and enjoying the privileges of office than in defending the people who elected them. Where is the serious scrutiny? Where is the determination to challenge executive excess? Why should Nigerians go on paying so much for representatives so reluctant to represent them? I want the present arrangement dismantled through a lawful constitutional process and replaced with a smaller, cheaper and more accountable legislature. An institution that actually monitors the executive, scrutinises public spending and protects the Constitution. Its members should understand that their duty is to the Nigerian people, and they should face consequences when they betray it. The Constitution itself needs rewriting through a genuinely representative civilian process. Nigerians must have a meaningful say in the rules under which they live, the powers government exercises and the protections citizens can actually enforce. We need a constitution fit for Nigeria in 2026 and beyond. One that addresses our diversity, makes public office accountable and prevents any president from treating the country as a personal possession. None of this requires a gun. It requires peaceful public pressure, political organisation and constitutional reform. It requires Nigerians to work together across the very divisions that politicians have found so useful for keeping us apart. My anger comes from knowing that Nigeria can do better. We have the people, the intelligence and the ability. What we lack is a system that consistently brings capable people into government and holds them to account once they get there. If demanding that makes me a revolutionary in somebody's eyes, so be it. I call it expecting my country to be properly governed. That is not revolution. That is democracy, and I am angry that we still do not have it. Nigeria belongs to Nigerians. #TheKioSolution #LettersFromStockholm #NigeriaDecides2027 #ConstitutionalReform #NationalAssembly #Accountability #DiasporaVoice #KioAmachree

La-Cram, La-Pour: How Nigeria Educated Itself Into a Zombie State� Letters from Stockholm, by Kio Amachree I watch them on television. I listen to them at podiums. Ministers, governors, senators, heads of agencies, men who hold the fate of over two hundred million people in their hands. And one thought keeps entering my head, and it will not leave. These men crammed. They memorised the book. They memorised the lecture. They memorised the past questions, the cut-off marks, the definitions, the dates. They can recite. What they cannot do is understand. And a man who can recite but cannot understand is a dangerous thing to hand power to, because he will perform the appearance of a job without ever grasping what the job is for. Nigerians have a phrase for it that needs no translation at home: la-cram, la-pour. Cram it in, pour it out, forget it by Monday. A Nigerian doctoral researcher writing in TheCable put it bluntly: our system teaches students that learning means being told facts, remembering them, and saying them back flawlessly to someone else. Professor Peter Okebukola, a former Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, has said the same thing in his own way, that a curriculum overloaded to cover the syllabus produces cramming, not thinking. I was not educated in Nigeria. I was sent to England at eight, and from Holmewood House to Eton to Wharton I was taught by men and women whose job was to make me argue, to make me defend a position and then attack it, to make me ask why before I was allowed to say what. My history master at Eton did not want me to tell him what happened in 1832. He wanted me to tell him why it mattered and whether the textbook was wrong. That is the difference. That is the whole difference. One system produces a mind. The other produces a parrot with a certificate. And then I came home for National Service and sat in the National Assembly and the Presidency and watched the parrots run the country. Let me be clear about what I am not saying. I am not saying Nigerians are stupid. I am saying the opposite. Nigerians are among the most naturally intelligent people on earth, and the proof is what they do the moment they leave: they run hospitals in Houston, banks in London, engineering firms in Stockholm. The raw material is magnificent. The factory is broken. Look at what the factory is producing. In the 2025 UTME, 1.5 million of the 1.9 million candidates, more than 78 per cent, scored below 200 out of 400. Only 12,414 candidates, 0.63 per cent, scored 300 or above. In 2024 the share below 200 was 76 per cent. In 2022 it was 78 per cent. JAMB itself has published that since computer-based testing began in 2013, the share of candidates scoring 200 and above has swung between 11 and 34 per cent. Read that again. In the best year on record, two out of three candidates could not reach half marks. This is not a bad year. This is the system working exactly as designed. In the 2026 WASSCE for school candidates, released this summer, 61.54 per cent obtained five credits including English and Mathematics. Sixty-one per cent sounds respectable until you notice that WAEC withheld the results of 167,486 candidates, 8.59 per cent of everyone who sat, over examination malpractice. Nearly one in twelve. The fake question papers, the "miracle centres", the parents who pay for answers: that is cramming's natural child. When the certificate is the goal and understanding is irrelevant, cheating is not a deviation from the system. It is a shortcut through it. And beneath the exam halls there is a deeper rot. The World Bank's estimate is that more than 70 per cent of Nigerian ten-year-olds cannot read and understand a simple sentence. UNICEF and the World Bank put foundational literacy among children aged seven to fourteen at roughly one in four. Even among children who are in school at the right age, only four in ten can read at a basic level. A UNICEF official in Kano said it without decoration: on top of the 10.5 million out-of-school children, 70 per cent of the children who are in school are not learning. So picture the pipeline. UNICEF counts 10.2 million primary-age children and 8.1 million junior-secondary-age children out of school entirely. The Minister of Education disputes the figure and says a full count will show seven to eight million; I note the dispute and I note that even his number is a catastrophe. Of the children who get in, most cannot read by ten. Of those who reach the exam hall, three in four cannot score half marks. And of the survivors who crawl through to a university, the universities themselves teach by dictation and test by regurgitation. Now ask yourself what kind of man emerges at the top of that pipeline forty years later, clutching his certificates, and is handed a ministry. He is a man who has never once been rewarded for asking why. Every reward in his life came from reproducing what he was told. So when he is appointed to run power, or petroleum, or health, he does not ask what the ministry is for, what the numbers mean, what the consequences will be in five years. He asks what he is supposed to say. He reads the speech his aides wrote. He signs what is placed in front of him. He memorises the talking points and pours them out at the press conference. And when the policy fails, as it must, he is genuinely bewildered, because he did everything correctly. He said all the right words. That is the zombie. Not a stupid man. A man who was trained from the age of five never to think, and who now holds power he does not understand over jobs he cannot see. This is why I have argued, and will keep arguing, for a law requiring verified educational qualifications and certified good health before anyone can be President. But I now understand that is only the floor. A verified certificate from a cramming factory still proves nothing about whether the holder can think. We must fix what the certificate measures. The Kio Solution has five demands. One. A national foundational literacy emergency. Every Nigerian child reads with comprehension by age ten, measured annually by an independent body, with results published state by state so that governors can be shamed by name. Two. End the memory exam. WAEC, NECO and JAMB must be directed, by law, to shift the weight of every paper toward reasoning, application and argument, with an independent review of question papers every year. If the exam rewards thinking, the classroom will follow. If it rewards cramming, nothing else we do will matter. Three. Retrain the teachers before you reprint the textbooks. A curriculum is only as good as the person delivering it. A national teacher-retraining programme in questioning, discussion and problem-based methods, funded from the federal budget and tied to pay progression. Four. Treat examination malpractice as organised crime. Prosecute the miracle centres, the paper sellers and the officials who feed them, and publish the convictions. A country that lets one in twelve results be withheld for cheating every year has told its children exactly what it values. Five. A thinking test for public office. Any nominee for ministerial or agency headship should face a published, televised confirmation hearing in which senators ask them to explain, in their own words, what the ministry does, what its budget is, and what they would change. No notes. No aides. If they cannot explain the job, they cannot have the job. Nigeria does not have a shortage of certificates. It has a surplus of certificates and a famine of understanding. We have built a country run by men who can recite the constitution but cannot tell you what Section 145 is for. We did this to ourselves, one past-question booklet at a time. Nothing I write here is personal. It is politics. And the politics of a nation begins in the classroom, where we decide whether to raise citizens or parrots. Nigeria belongs to Nigerians. #TheKioSolution #LettersFromStockholm #NigeriaEducation #LaCramLaPour #JAMB #WAEC #OutOfSchoolChildren #LearningPoverty #NigeriaShameOnYou #DiasporaVoice #KioAmachree Sources: • UTME 2025 – 1.5 million candidates scored below 200 – JAMB (Premium Times) • Nearly 80% of 2025 UTME candidates score below 200 (ICIR) • UTME Results: Over 70% of candidates score below 200, says JAMB – 2024 (Peoples Gazette) • JAMB full statement: comparison of UTME results since inception of CBT in 2013 • WAEC releases 2026 WASSCE results, 61.54% pass rate (Premium Times via AllAfrica) • WAEC releases 2026 WASSCE results – 167,486 withheld for malpractice (The Guardian Nigeria) • Kano, Katsina, Jigawa have 16% of Nigeria's 10.2 million out-of-school children – UNICEF (AllAfrica) • Nigeria's education faces challenge of retaining students – UNICEF: 10.2m primary and 8.1m junior secondary out of school (The Guardian Nigeria) • Literacy, insecurity and Nigeria's children – minister disputes out-of-school figure (Daily Trust) • Nigeria's 37m children can't read, understand simple text – World Bank (BusinessDay) • UNICEF: 70% of schoolchildren in Nigeria not getting quality education (TheCable) • La-cram, la-pour and higher education (TheCable) • Experts advocate inclusion of critical thinking in Nigeria's education curriculum – Okebukola (BusinessDay) See less

ASO ROCK IS NOT A FAMILY BUSINESS By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm I am increasingly disturbed by the political role Oluremi Tinubu is carving out for herself. Nigerians elected her husband President. They did not elect his wife to share his authority, and they did not elect his children to form an additional layer of government. The title of First Lady carries visibility and influence, but it comes with no independent executive powers under our Constitution. That distinction matters when the President’s wife is discussing international affairs with ambassadors and supplying vehicles for the ruling party’s election machinery. On 22 October, Mrs Tinubu met China’s ambassador, Yu Dunhai. China’s Foreign Ministry says their discussion covered bilateral relations, trade concessions, African security issues and mining cooperation. These are serious subjects involving Nigeria’s economic and strategic interests. I have no objection to an ambassador paying her a courtesy visit. What I want explained is the capacity in which she speaks when the conversation moves into foreign policy. Was she conveying an authorised government position? Was our Foreign Ministry involved? What record exists of the discussion? That meeting alone does not prove she was standing in for her husband. But Nigerians should not have to guess where her personal influence ends and the authority of their government begins. The vehicles raise an even more immediate question. Mrs Tinubu has confirmed donating vehicles to the APC youth wing for mobilisation ahead of the 2027 election. Seven new Toyota Prado SUVs were displayed by the party’s youth leader, Dayo Israel, in a post he subsequently deleted. Her meeting with the youth leaders took place at the State House. I find this spectacle offensive. People are struggling to feed their families, keep children in school and pay for treatment, yet the governing party can parade expensive vehicles for its political organisers. The same Nigerians being told to endure hardship are watching those close to power enjoy another round of privileges. Where did the money come from? The exact cost and funding arrangements have not been publicly disclosed. I will therefore not pretend that estimates circulating online are verified accounts, or claim that the vehicles were bought with stolen public money. But Mrs Tinubu should publish the facts. Who purchased them? Who donated them? What did they cost? Who now owns them? If private donors paid, Nigerians should know their identities and whether they have business before this government. A gift channelled through the President’s wife may carry expectations, even when nobody says so publicly. Disclosure would allow the public to examine those relationships instead of being expected to take everything on trust. If public resources were involved, the Presidency must explain the legal authority and public purpose. Party mobilisation is APC business. Any use of government money, staff or facilities to support it deserves scrutiny. There is also a correction we must make to the claim that the First Lady has “no budget”. Her position has no independent constitutional executive mandate, but money has nevertheless been appropriated for it. In 2023, the National Assembly approved ₦1.5 billion for vehicles for her office. That allocation does not explain the funding of these latest vehicles, but it demonstrates why Parliament cannot escape responsibility for the spending surrounding her activities. How much public support does the First Lady’s operation receive across the relevant government accounts? What expenditure is authorised, who approves it, and where can Nigerians examine the results? These are reasonable questions about public money. Neither a charitable initiative nor the prestige of the presidential household should place anyone beyond them. My deeper concern is the influence of the Tinubu family within Aso Rock. I suspect Mrs Tinubu and her stepson, Seyi Tinubu, wield more power than their publicly stated roles would justify. I cannot prove that they jointly run the government. But I want to know whether ministers and officials receive instructions from family members, and whether access to the President is being used to exercise authority without responsibility. I remain concerned about the President’s health. I cannot establish a diagnosis from public appearances, nor prove that illness has made his wife the effective head of government. My fear is that uncertainty about his capacity may create room for unelected relatives to exercise greater influence. That concern should be answered through openness about how decisions are made. If a President becomes unable to discharge his duties, the Constitution provides a process. His wife does not become President. His son does not acquire a share of the office. I consider this blurring of family influence, government prestige and party campaigning unacceptable. Mrs Tinubu has every right to support her husband and campaign for the APC. She should also expect searching questions when she uses the standing of First Lady to do so. The National Assembly should demand the relevant accounts and scrutinise any public expenditure. The Presidency should explain her diplomatic mandate. The APC should disclose how these campaign vehicles were financed. Nigeria has capable diplomats, public servants and constitutional officeholders. They must be allowed to do their jobs through institutions whose decisions can be questioned and whose spending can be examined. I want a country governed openly, where an official’s authority comes from law and where the President’s family is subject to the same scrutiny as everyone else. Aso Rock belongs to Nigerians. The Tinubu family are temporary occupants, and they should never be allowed to forget it. #LettersFromStockholm #Nigeria #Accountability #Transparency #RuleOfLaw

2027: OUR ANGER MUST REACH THE BALLOT BOX By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm I do not write about Nigeria’s failures simply to collect likes, shares and sympathetic comments. My articles will have failed in their purpose if they produce applause while nothing changes on the ground. As 2027 approaches, we must confront an uncomfortable truth: social media opposition can create an illusion of political strength unless it translates into organisation, voter participation and sustained public accountability. An administration does not lose power because its critics win arguments online. The lessons of 2023 deserve serious attention. Millions of Nigerians participated in that election with hope and determination. Their commitment should never be dismissed. But the European Union’s observation mission identified weaknesses in electoral administration that damaged trust in INEC, and called for greater transparency, accessible results and action against impunity for electoral offences. Those concerns demand practical answers before another election. (eeas.europa.eu⁠) The work must therefore reach communities, wards and polling units. Opposition parties need credible local organisation, properly trained polling agents and the capacity to document irregularities. Citizens need reliable information about participating and reporting intimidation. Civil society needs the resources and independence to scrutinise the process from beginning to end. Online enthusiasm must support that work. It cannot replace it. INEC should be left in no doubt about the standard Nigerians expect: an election whose procedures are transparent, whose results can be scrutinised and whose officials are answerable for misconduct. Any attempt to intimidate voters, falsify results or obstruct scrutiny must meet organised, peaceful resistance through documented evidence, legal challenges and sustained nonviolent protest. That is what I mean by people power: citizens exercising their democratic rights with discipline, courage and persistence. Aso Rock must also understand that criticism cannot be wished away by surrounding the president with loyalists who tell him only what he wants to hear. Presidential applause is a poor measure of public consent. I want Bola Tinubu to leave office peacefully through democratic defeat. I believe many Nigerians share that wish. The proper test is a credible election in which every citizen can participate freely and every valid vote counts. If the electorate rejects him, he must accept that verdict and leave. But replacing a president will not, by itself, end corruption. I want credible allegations of embezzlement investigated independently. I want those responsible prosecuted and, where convicted after fair trials, jailed in accordance with the law. I want stolen assets recovered and returned to public use. Political influence, family connections and party membership must provide no shelter from accountability. Every naira stolen from the public represents something denied to somebody else: treatment, education, security, infrastructure or the chance of a decent life. We cannot continue treating the theft of public money as an ordinary privilege of political success. I also want transparency about any undisclosed relationships between Nigeria’s leaders and foreign intelligence agencies, including the CIA in Langley, Virginia. On Tinubu specifically, suspicion must be tested against evidence. The April 2025 US court ruling upheld the CIA’s refusal to confirm or deny whether responsive records existed; it did not establish that Tinubu works for, or is controlled by, the agency. That distinction matters. My demand is for verifiable answers about any relationship that could compromise Nigeria’s sovereignty. (law.justia.com⁠) Our credibility as critics depends on applying the same standards of evidence that we demand from those in power. There must also be serious reform of the judiciary and security services. Nigeria needs transparent judicial appointments, institutional independence, timely justice and credible investigation of judicial misconduct. Citizens must be able to challenge powerful officials without believing that the outcome has already been purchased. The security services must protect the public and the electoral process. Officers who intimidate voters, abuse detainees or act as political enforcers must face independent investigation and consequences where wrongdoing is established. No public institution should become hired muscle for a president, his family, his associates or his party. And any opposition seeking our votes must explain how it will prevent these abuses under its own administration. We should demand open procurement, effective audits, protection for whistleblowers, independent investigations and public reporting on recovered assets. A promise to fight corruption means little without institutions capable of exposing and punishing it. Nigeria should lead Africa through the strength of its democracy, the quality of its institutions and the dignity it affords its people. I fear that four more years of Tinubu’s leadership would deepen the damage and make recovery harder. I will continue to write because silence would betray my convictions. But writing must help produce action. Let us organise, vote, document wrongdoing and insist peacefully on an honest count. Let us remain engaged after the election, whoever wins. Nigeria deserves citizens whose determination lasts longer than the news cycle. #Nigeria2027 #ElectoralIntegrity #Accountability #PeoplePower #LettersFromStockholm

Letters from Stockholm The Elderly Abuse of Bola Tinubu By Kio Amachree There is a word for what is being done to the President of Nigeria, and it is not a political word. It is a word social workers use. It is elderly abuse. Elderly abuse does not only mean hitting an old man or stealing his pension. The textbooks define it to include exploitation: using a frail person's name, authority and assets for the benefit of those around him, while he is no longer fully able to protect himself or to say no. Nigeria is watching a case study unfold on live television, and the victim is sitting in Aso Rock. Every Nigerian with eyes can see what the Presidency insists we cannot. The President is very old. He is unsteady on his feet. His hands tremble in public. His speech wanders. He has stumbled on state occasions, at home and abroad, in front of cameras that cannot be bribed. He has just come back from four weeks in London and Paris, a trip his handlers called a working vacation, from which his return was rescheduled at least twice while the opposition asked where he was and whether he was well. He missed the United Nations General Assembly. He has visited France more often than most Nigerians have visited their own villages, on trips described variously as private, working, and official, and the one place his spokesmen swear he never goes is a hospital. I do not believe them. More importantly, Nigerians do not believe them. Let us be honest about his age. The official record says 1952. Nobody in Lagos who was an adult in the 1960s believes it. Bola Tinubu was my late mother's contemporary. That generation has largely gone. The man we are watching is, by the reckoning of people who knew him before he reinvented himself, well past eighty and quite possibly closer to ninety. A country of two hundred and fifty million people is being run, on paper, by a man whose true date of birth is a state secret. Then there is his health. The rumours are relentless, and they are not all idle. There have been persistent reports of serious illness, including cancer, requiring treatment that Nigeria's own hospitals either cannot provide or are not trusted to provide. The Presidency calls every such report politically motivated. Fine. Then publish his medical records. Every serious democracy expects it. The refusal is the answer. Now to the abusers. I watched, from a distance, what Jill Biden did to her husband. She knew. Everyone around him knew. And she kept a sick, visibly declining old man in a presidential race because the power attached to him was too sweet to surrender. The world called it loyalty. It was not loyalty. It was exploitation, and the whole Democratic Party was complicit until a single debate made the lie impossible. Remi Tinubu is no better. I suspect, and I am entitled to suspect because the evidence is on our screens, that the First Lady is running a substantial part of this government from behind closed doors, in her husband's name, with his signature and without his full capacity. A senator by profession, a politician by temperament, she has every motive to keep him in the chair and none to let him go home and rest. That is not devotion. That is a woman using a frail man as a rubber stamp. And then there is Seyi Tinubu. Here, there and everywhere. In Kano, in Kaduna, in Lagos, in London. Receiving governors. Dispensing favours. Convening youth groups. Flexing political muscle on a scale that no private citizen in Nigerian history has ever been permitted. He holds no office. He was elected by nobody. He is accountable to nobody. He is, in every practical sense, a de facto prime minister, and his only qualification is that his father is too weak to stop him. A son who loved his father would be fighting to get him out of that building. This one is fighting to keep him in it, because the day the old man leaves, Seyi's power evaporates. This is the Paul Biya model. Cameroon has spent years governed by an absent, ailing old man whose family and courtiers rule in his name while the country rots. Nigeria cannot afford a Biya. Not with our international reputation already in the gutter. Not with the American courts having forced into the open the 1993 Chicago forfeiture in which the President surrendered nearly half a million dollars the United States government linked to heroin trafficking. Not with corruption on a scale that would embarrass Abacha. Not with bandits and kidnappers running whole states. Running Nigeria requires a sound mind and a fit body. It is not a part-time job for a convalescent. It is not a family business. And it is not a throne for a man to be propped up on by a wife and a son who have discovered that a weak president is far more useful to them than a strong one. The Constitution has a remedy. Section 144 allows the cabinet to declare a president incapable. It will never be used, because every minister knows who put him there and who will take him out. So the remedy must come from Nigerians themselves, loudly and relentlessly, until the question cannot be avoided: who is actually governing Nigeria, and by what right? Let the old man go home. If his family loved him, they would have taken him there already. Kio Amachree Worldview International, Stockholm

THE NIGERIAN WHO SAT AT U THANT'S TABLE: HOW MY FATHER BECAME THE FIRST AFRICAN UNDER-SECRETARY-GENERAL OF THE UNITED NATIONS By Kio Amachree In November 1961 the United Nations was an organisation in shock. Dag Hammarskjöld had been killed in an air crash two months earlier on his way to negotiate a ceasefire in Katanga. The Soviet Union had spent a year demanding that the office of Secretary-General be split three ways, one head for each bloc. The compromise that saved the office put a quiet Burmese diplomat, U Thant, in the chair as Acting Secretary-General, and left him to prove that one man could run the organisation and keep the Congo from collapsing at the same time. To do that he needed a Secretariat that looked like the world it served. Seventeen African states had joined the UN in 1960 alone. Not one African sat in its senior ranks. That was the vacancy my father filled. THE RECOMMENDATION FROM LAGOS The appointment did not fall from the sky. Nigeria, one year independent and already the largest African voice in the General Assembly, pressed the case. Prime Minister Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa backed the nomination of Chief Godfrey Kio Jaja Amachree QC, then Solicitor-General of the Federation, and Jaja Wachuku, Nigeria's first Permanent Representative to the United Nations and its first Foreign Minister, carried the case through the corridors in New York. Wachuku's biographers record it as one of his achievements: he secured the appointment of the first African Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, and the man was Nigeria's Amachree. U Thant accepted the recommendation. In early 1962 my father resigned from the Nigerian civil service and took up his post at the Secretariat. The UN's biographical note on him, BIO/140, was issued in February of that year. The rank was then styled Under-Secretary; the office has since been renamed Under-Secretary-General, which is why he is remembered under both titles. He was the first African from the continent to hold it. TWO PORTFOLIOS, ONE DESK He was given two responsibilities at once, and either would have been a full job. The first was Trusteeship and Information from Non-Self-Governing Territories. The Trusteeship Council still had territories under its charge, and every colonial power was obliged under the Charter to report to the General Assembly on the territories it had not yet freed. All of that paper, the reporting, the petitions, the visiting missions, came through my father's department. The UN photo archive from May 1964 shows him in London with the Sub-Committee on Southern Rhodesia, the file that would later become one of the longest-running decolonisation disputes of the century. A Nigerian lawyer who had been born a colonial subject now sat at the desk that processed the retreat of empire. The family has never lost sight of that symmetry. The second portfolio was the emergency: Under-Secretary in Charge of Congo Civilian Operations. THE CONGO FILE The world remembers the blue helmets of ONUC. It has largely forgotten the civilian operation that ran alongside them. When the Belgians left in 1960 they took with them almost everyone who knew how to run a hospital, a customs post, a treasury, an airfield or a telephone exchange. The UN's job was to stop a country the size of Western Europe from ceasing to function, and that job was civilian. The UN archives list my father as the headquarters official in charge of that effort. Reporting to him from Leopoldville were the Officer-in-Charge of ONUC, Robert Gardiner of Ghana from January 1962 to May 1963, and the Chief of Civilian Operations in the field. Beneath them the specialised agencies each ran a mission inside the Congo: the World Health Organization for medicine, UNESCO for schools, the FAO for food, ICAO for airfields and air traffic control, the ITU, the Universal Postal Union, the ILO and the World Meteorological Organization. The International Monetary Fund worked on unifying the Congolese currency. The subject files that survive in the archives under his name cover public health, relief, the Congo Fund, airlifts, the training of judges, the economics and finances of the country, and eventually the withdrawal of the mission. The purpose of all of it was to make the UN redundant. Every expert was there to leave behind a Congolese who could do the work. Fellow Nigerians served in that effort; Francis Nwokedi, Nigeria's first Permanent Secretary for Foreign Affairs, was seconded to reorganise the Congolese civil service. WHY IT MATTERS NOW Nigeria in 1962 had the confidence to put forward one of its best men for one of the hardest jobs on earth, and the world accepted him. Balewa recommended, Wachuku negotiated, U Thant appointed, and a Kalabari lawyer from Buguma spent four years holding the Congo's civil administration together while supervising the paperwork of decolonisation for a continent. He left the Secretariat in 1966. The exchange of letters between him and U Thant on his departure is still catalogued in the UN Digital Library. The Congo file still carries his name. The man who kept a country standing is remembered, if at all, in footnotes. This is the story I am writing to change that. Sources: - [Jaja Wachuku – Wikipedia](en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaja_W…) - [UN Archives: United Nations Operation in the Congo (ONUC) 1960–1964](search.archives.un.org/downl…) - [UN Archives: Office for Special Political Affairs 1955–1991](search.archives.un.org/downl…) - [UN Digital Library: Letters exchanged between U Thant and Godfrey K. J. Amachree](digitallibrary.un.org/record…) - [Robert K. A. Gardiner – Wikipedia](en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert…) - [Selection and Appointment of U Thant – UN](un.org/sg/en/content/selecti…) - [Auburn Plainsman, February 1966](content.lib.auburn.edu/digit…)

ARE NIGERIANS REALLY HAPPY WITH THE CHOICES BEFORE THEM IN 2027? By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm I have been asking myself a question that I believe millions of Nigerians should be asking as we approach the 2027 presidential election. Are we genuinely satisfied with the people presenting themselves as our future leaders, or are we simply being asked to choose between the same familiar political faces? Nigeria is a country of over 200 million people, blessed with extraordinary talent, intelligence, education and experience. Yet whenever a presidential election approaches, we seem to return to the same small circle of politicians, many of whom have dominated our political landscape for decades. Surely, Nigeria can produce more choices than this. Recent opinion surveys reveal something interesting. According to Yiaga Africa’s October 2026 findings, 49% of respondents were motivated by a desire for leadership change, while only 16% cited particular candidates as their motivation. A substantial proportion of prospective voters had not even settled on whom they wanted to support. That should tell our political establishment something. Nigerians are not necessarily enthusiastic about the choices being offered to them. Many want change, but wanting change and believing in those promising to deliver it are two very different things. We have Bola Tinubu, the incumbent president, whose administration has faced widespread criticism over the cost of living, insecurity and economic hardship. Then we have Atiku Abubakar, who has been pursuing the presidency for decades, and Peter Obi, who continues to command considerable support, particularly among Nigerians seeking a different political direction. But I ask a simple question: Are these really the only people Nigeria can produce? Where are the accomplished Nigerians who have built successful institutions, managed complex organisations, demonstrated integrity in public service and shown that leadership can be about something other than acquiring political power? Why must presidential ambition in Nigeria appear to be the preserve of established political networks, wealthy financiers and individuals who have spent much of their adult lives moving from one political party to another? I am not suggesting that experience should count for nothing. Quite the opposite. But experience must be accompanied by achievement, accountability, character and a genuine understanding of the responsibilities of leadership. I also believe Nigerians must stop confusing popularity with competence. A politician attracting enormous crowds, commanding millions of social media followers or delivering entertaining speeches is not necessarily equipped to govern one of Africa’s most complicated countries. We have made that mistake too often. The tragedy is that our political system makes it extraordinarily difficult for credible newcomers to emerge. Party structures, nomination processes, campaign financing and political patronage all favour those already inside the system. And so the same names return, election after election, while millions of Nigerians are left wondering whether anything will ever change. I would genuinely like to hear from Nigerians across the country, regardless of ethnicity, religion or political affiliation. Are you satisfied with the presidential choices emerging for 2027? Do you believe Tinubu, Atiku, Obi or any of the other familiar political figures represent the leadership Nigeria needs? Or do you believe this country deserves an entirely new generation of candidates? I am particularly interested in hearing from those who support none of them. Because one thing is becoming increasingly clear to me: dissatisfaction with the government does not automatically translate into confidence in the opposition. Nigeria does not lack capable people. What we must examine is why our political system so rarely gives them the opportunity to lead. Perhaps the most important question for 2027 is not simply who should replace whom, but why Nigerians are repeatedly presented with such a limited choice of people seeking the highest office in the land. I would like to hear your views. Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm #LettersFromStockholm #KioAmachree #Nigeria2027 #NigeriaDecides2027 #NigerianPolitics #LeadershipMatters #GoodGovernance #PoliticalReform #Democracy #Accountability #NigeriaDeservesBetter #FutureOfNigeria

NIGERIA FOR SALE: ARE MINISTERIAL APPOINTMENTS NOW WORTH BILLIONS OF NAIRA? By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm | 24 October 2026 I have written extensively about corruption in Nigeria, but what emerged from an interview on Arise Television on Thursday, 22 October, deserves the attention of every Nigerian. Alwan Hassan, a spokesperson for President Bola Tinubu’s own APC Presidential Campaign Council, alleged that some individuals pay billions of naira to become ministers and, once appointed, immediately begin thinking about how to recover their investment. His exact words were extraordinary: “A lot of ministers pay billions and billions, and you know, to get themselves appointed. The first thing they think of is how to recoup that money.” Read that again. We are talking about billions of naira allegedly changing hands before a minister has even taken the oath of office. Not millions. Billions. And this allegation did not come from an opposition activist or an investigative journalist. It came from a spokesman associated with the President’s own political campaign. Hassan suggested that this practice predates the present administration. That is entirely possible. But invoking previous governments does not answer the questions now confronting this one. WHO IS SELLING THE MINISTERIAL APPOINTMENTS? Under Section 147 of the Nigerian Constitution, the President nominates ministers and the Senate confirms them. There is no constitutional provision for purchasing a ministerial portfolio. So if Hassan’s allegation is true, we need to know who receives these extraordinary payments. Are they political intermediaries? Party officials? Individuals close to the Presidency? Or people claiming to have influence over the appointment process? And how can anyone afford to pay billions of naira for a government appointment unless they believe that the office will provide opportunities to recover considerably more? This is the central question. A man who allegedly spends ₦2 billion obtaining a ministerial appointment is hardly likely to regard that expenditure as a charitable donation to the Nigerian people. He may regard it as an investment. And investments are expected to produce returns. THE BUSINESS OF RECOVERING YOUR INVESTMENT Consider the implications. A minister arrives in Abuja having allegedly spent billions securing his position. He now controls, or exercises influence over, a ministry responsible for public expenditure, contracts, procurement and government projects. What happens next? The obvious corruption risks include inflated contracts, kickbacks, payments for nonexistent projects, manipulated procurement procedures and the diversion of funds intended for public services. These are potential mechanisms, not proof that every minister engages in them. But they illustrate why the allegation is so dangerous. Money that should build hospitals, equip schools, repair roads and provide electricity could instead become the means of recovering the price of political office. And ordinary Nigerians would ultimately bear the cost. THIS IS NOT THE FIRST TIME WE HAVE HEARD SUCH ALLEGATIONS In March 2025, former Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai reportedly alleged that he knew individuals who had paid to become ministers. He did not publicly substantiate the allegation. In August 2026, the Financial Times reported another controversy involving a purported federal agency and allegations that ₦400 million had been paid to secure an appointment. The President’s Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila, denied the accusation and pursued legal action. These allegations cannot simply be treated as established facts. But neither should serious claims about the sale of public appointments be allowed to disappear without investigation. Nigeria has already witnessed major corruption investigations involving federal ministries. In April 2024, Reuters reported that the EFCC had recovered approximately ₦32.7 billion and $445,000 during investigations involving the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation. Those recoveries did not prove that ministerial appointments were purchased. They did, however, demonstrate the enormous sums potentially involved in corruption investigations surrounding public administration. AND WHAT DOES PRESIDENT TINUBU KNOW? This is where the matter becomes particularly serious. Hassan made his allegation while defending Tinubu’s direct supervision of government expenditure and questioning whether ministers should control substantial public funds. But that argument creates another problem. If the President’s own political spokesman believes ministerial appointments are being purchased, the appropriate response is not simply to restrict ministerial spending. It is to establish whether the appointments were corruptly obtained. Who paid? Who collected? Who facilitated the transactions? Were any serving ministers involved? And has the Presidency received information about these allegations? The President should be able to answer whether he has ordered an investigation. NIGERIA CANNOT CONTINUE TO TREAT PUBLIC OFFICE AS A COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISE For too long, Nigerians have heard allegations of political godfathers, purchased influence, questionable contracts and public money disappearing into private pockets. Yet the machinery of government continues operating while accountability remains elusive. The consequences extend beyond stolen money. A country cannot build credible institutions if appointments are influenced by financial transactions rather than integrity, qualifications and public service. It cannot expect efficient government if officials enter office believing they must recover the cost of getting there. And it cannot persuade citizens to make sacrifices while failing to investigate allegations that political appointments themselves have become commodities. MY DEMAND IS SIMPLE. The EFCC and ICPC should invite Alwan Hassan to explain precisely what he knows. He should identify the individuals involved, disclose the basis of his allegations and provide whatever evidence he possesses. If payments were made, those responsible should face investigation and, where the evidence warrants it, prosecution. If his allegations are baseless, Nigerians deserve to know that too. This matter is too serious to be dismissed as another political controversy that dominates the headlines for two days and is then forgotten. I have spent years arguing that Nigeria’s problem is not a shortage of money, intelligence or natural resources. It is the failure to build institutions capable of protecting the public interest against private enrichment. And if government appointments are indeed being bought for billions, the problem begins long before the first inflated contract is signed. A ministerial appointment is a public responsibility, not an investment portfolio. Nigeria deserves to know whether the people appointed to serve the country have first been required to pay for the privilege. And if they have, the next question is unavoidable: How much has the Nigerian taxpayer already paid to reimburse them? Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm #Nigeria #Tinubu #Corruption #APC #EFCC #ICPC #Accountability #GoodGovernance #PoliticalCorruption #LettersFromStockholm #KioAmachree Sources behind the article: TheCable, 23 October 2026⁠; Punch, 23 October 2026⁠; Financial Times investigation⁠; . The central issue is whether investigators can obtain evidence of actual payments, rather than relying solely on political statements. I can also monitor whether the EFCC, ICPC or Presidency opens an investigation into Hassan’s allegations and alert you to significant developments.

THE PLUNDER OF NIGERIA’S OCEANS: HOW FOREIGN FISHING FLEETS ARE DESTROYING OUR MARINE WEALTH By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm For decades, foreign industrial fishing vessels have been taking fish from Nigerian waters, damaging our marine environment and threatening the livelihoods of coastal communities. Yet this enormous national problem receives remarkably little attention. We talk endlessly about stolen crude oil, illegal mining, corruption and the billions of dollars disappearing from our economy. But what about the wealth being removed from the Atlantic Ocean every day? Who is protecting Nigeria’s fish? Who is protecting the fishermen of the Niger Delta, Lagos, Ondo, Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom and Cross River? And who is accounting for the money being made from our marine resources? This is not a new problem. It has been developing for generations, and the scientific evidence is deeply disturbing. THE DESTRUCTION BEGAN DECADES AGO Nigeria possesses approximately 853 kilometres of Atlantic coastline and an exclusive economic zone extending up to 200 nautical miles offshore. These waters contain commercially valuable fish and shrimp species, including croaker, sole, catfish and other marine resources that have supported coastal communities for generations. But industrial trawling has transformed the fishing industry. A scientific study published in Marine and Coastal Fisheries in 2019 examined Nigerian coastal fisheries between 1950 and 2010. It reported that approximately 80% of assessed fish stocks were fully exploited, overexploited or collapsed. The study also found that fishing power increased dramatically over the decades, while industrial trawlers moved progressively farther offshore and into deeper waters. This is not something that began under President Tinubu. It is a longstanding failure of fisheries management involving successive Nigerian administrations. And it has been allowed to continue. THE MONSTER NETS THAT DESTROY THE SEABED One of the most destructive methods used by industrial fishing vessels is bottom trawling. These enormous vessels drag heavy nets across the ocean floor, sometimes using weighted equipment and metal doors to keep the nets open. The consequences can be devastating. The nets capture valuable fish and shrimp, but they can also sweep up juvenile fish, turtles, sharks and other marine creatures that were never intended to be caught. They disturb sediments, damage seabed habitats and destroy organisms that form part of the marine food chain. Where vulnerable coral communities and other sensitive seabed ecosystems are present, heavy trawling equipment can cause serious and sometimes long-lasting damage. I want to distinguish between what is scientifically established and what still needs investigation. Bottom trawling is known to damage coral habitats, but the extent of coral destruction specifically within Nigerian waters has not been adequately documented in the evidence available. That is itself a reason for comprehensive marine habitat surveys. A fishing industry cannot survive indefinitely if we destroy the environment in which fish feed, reproduce and develop. We are not merely losing today’s catch. We are threatening tomorrow’s fish. FOREIGN FLEETS AND THE QUESTION OF WHO PROFITS Chinese-owned and other foreign-linked industrial fishing operations have repeatedly been identified in investigations into illegal and unregulated fishing across West Africa. Nigeria is no exception. A 2020 investigation reported by the Fisheries Committee for the West Central Gulf of Guinea described illegal transshipment activities involving foreign-owned vessels in Nigerian and Ghanaian waters. Transshipment allows fish caught by one vessel to be transferred to another, potentially making it more difficult to establish where the fish originated and whether the catch was legal. Some foreign-linked vessels operate under licences. Others have been accused of fishing without proper authorisation, entering restricted coastal waters or exceeding their permitted catch. The distinction matters. Not every foreign vessel is operating illegally, but a legal licence must never become permission to destroy marine resources. There have also been allegations of cooperation between illegal operators and corrupt local intermediaries or officials. Which brings me to a question Nigerians should be asking: Who owns these fishing companies, who receives the licence fees, and who ultimately collects the dollars? We need public disclosure of the beneficial owners of industrial fishing vessels, their Nigerian partners, their fishing licences, their declared catches and their export earnings. HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS AT STAKE In 2019, THISDAY reported that Nigeria was losing approximately $600 million annually through illegal and unreported fishing. A January 2025 report in The Punch quoted fishing industry representatives estimating annual losses of approximately $70 million, particularly in relation to illegal fishing and outdated regulation. A more recent 2026 fisheries assessment estimated losses from illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing at approximately $450 million annually. These figures use different methodologies and should not be treated as interchangeable or added together. Nevertheless, they demonstrate the enormous economic stakes. Consider what this means. Fish that should support Nigerian businesses, generate legitimate tax revenue and provide affordable food are instead being depleted through poorly controlled exploitation. Meanwhile, Nigeria continues spending substantial amounts of foreign exchange importing fish. A 2026 fisheries assessment found that domestic production meets only about one-third of Nigeria’s annual fish demand of 3.2 million to 3.6 million metric tonnes. It estimated that imports cost the country more than $1 billion annually. We are a country surrounded by valuable marine resources, yet we cannot produce enough fish to feed ourselves. Of course, illegal trawling is not the only reason. Poor infrastructure, inadequate investment, pollution, climate change and weaknesses in aquaculture also contribute. But allowing illegal industrial fishing to continue makes an already difficult situation worse. THE FISHERMEN OF THE NIGER DELTA ARE PAYING THE PRICE I find the consequences for ordinary Nigerian fishermen particularly troubling. For generations, coastal families in Rivers, Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom and other states have depended on fishing. Fishing is not simply an occupation in these communities. It is a way of life, an inherited skill and an important part of the local economy. Small wooden boats and traditional nets cannot compete with industrial trawlers capable of harvesting enormous quantities of fish. In November 2025, a detailed investigation published by Premium Times documented how industrial vessels were capturing juvenile fish and selling unwanted catches to local traders. The investigation described the destruction of fishing equipment, declining fish stocks and the economic hardship affecting fishing communities. In February 2026, the Fisheries Cooperative Federation of Nigeria again warned that foreign industrial trawlers were entering Nigerian waters illegally, destroying local nets and depleting marine resources. Think about the injustice. A Nigerian fisherman ventures into the Atlantic to earn enough to feed his family. He returns with a poor catch, perhaps after spending money he can barely afford on fuel. Meanwhile, an industrial vessel with powerful engines, sophisticated navigation systems and enormous nets may have already harvested fish from the same waters. How is that fisherman supposed to compete? And what becomes of his children when fishing no longer provides a living? WHERE HAVE THE AUTHORITIES BEEN? It would be inaccurate to claim that absolutely nothing has been done. The Nigerian Navy has intercepted fishing vessels, including a trawler detained in Bayelsa in 2024 for allegedly operating inside a prohibited fishing zone. There have been patrols, arrests and official discussions about improving fisheries regulation. But the persistence of the problem demonstrates that enforcement has not been sufficient. The Nigerian government has maritime surveillance agencies, naval vessels, fisheries regulators and legal powers to control industrial fishing. Yet fishermen continue reporting illegal incursions. Why are industrial fishing vessels not subject to comprehensive, independently verified electronic monitoring? Why are fishing licences, vessel ownership records and catch declarations not easily accessible to the public? Why are repeat offenders not consistently exposed, prosecuted and prevented from returning? And why has Nigeria allowed its fisheries laws and enforcement systems to fall so far behind the technology used by modern industrial fishing fleets? These are questions for the Federal Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy, the Ministry of Livestock Development, the Nigerian Navy, fisheries regulators and the National Assembly. THE ENVIRONMENTAL COST IS EVEN GREATER THAN THE FINANCIAL LOSS An ocean is not an inexhaustible warehouse. Fish populations depend on delicate ecological relationships involving breeding grounds, seabed habitats, mangroves, estuaries and the availability of smaller marine organisms. When juvenile fish are repeatedly removed before they reproduce, future stocks suffer. When bottom habitats are damaged, the effects can extend far beyond the immediate fishing area. And when coastal ecosystems are already struggling with oil pollution, industrial waste, plastic contamination and rising ocean temperatures, destructive fishing adds another layer of pressure. Nigeria should urgently commission independent scientific surveys of its offshore fish populations, seabed habitats and vulnerable marine ecosystems. We need to know what has been lost, what remains and what can realistically be restored. WHAT NIGERIA MUST DO I believe Nigeria needs a comprehensive national fisheries protection programme built around the following measures: 1. Mandatory satellite and electronic monitoring of all licensed industrial fishing vessels, with independent auditing of suspicious activity. 2. Strict enforcement of protected coastal fishing zones, ensuring industrial trawlers cannot enter waters reserved for artisanal fishermen. 3. Restrictions on destructive bottom trawling, including bans in scientifically identified vulnerable habitats and essential breeding grounds. 4. A public register of fishing licences and beneficial ownership, identifying foreign interests, Nigerian partners and companies controlling industrial vessels. 5. Independent audits of fishing revenues, including licence fees, exports, declared catches and government receipts. 6. Meaningful penalties for illegal fishing, including confiscation of catches, suspension of licences and prosecution where warranted. 7. Investment in Nigerian fishing communities, including modern boats, cold-storage facilities, processing plants, affordable finance and sustainable aquaculture. 8. Scientific rebuilding of depleted fish stocks, using seasonal closures, protected areas and catch limits based on reliable research. These are practical measures already familiar to fisheries authorities around the world. Nigeria does not need to invent a new science to protect its waters. It needs to apply the knowledge and laws available to it. THE DOLLARS MUST NOT MATTER MORE THAN THE COUNTRY I have watched Nigeria repeatedly sacrifice long-term national interests for short-term financial gain. Our oil resources have been mismanaged. Our forests have suffered. Illegal mining has damaged communities. Now we must confront what has happened beneath the Atlantic. Foreign investment in fishing is not inherently wrong. Nigeria needs capital, technology, responsible partnerships and access to international markets. But foreign investment must operate under Nigerian law and within sustainable ecological limits. No amount of foreign exchange justifies the destruction of a country’s food supply. No fishing licence should permit the systematic depletion of breeding stocks. And no politically connected businessman should be allowed to profit from environmental damage while coastal communities become poorer. The uncomfortable truth is that Nigeria has spent decades discussing the value of its oil while paying insufficient attention to the extraordinary economic and nutritional importance of its fisheries. A country that cannot protect the fish in its own waters is placing both its food security and its coastal economy at risk. I want the National Assembly to investigate the industrial fishing industry, publish the ownership of licensed trawlers, examine historical enforcement failures and establish how much revenue Nigeria has lost. I also want the government to explain what it is doing to restore depleted fish populations and protect the people who have depended on the Atlantic for generations. This is our ocean. These are our resources. And the next generation of Nigerians has as much right to benefit from them as we do. Nigeria must stop treating its marine wealth as something to be exploited today without regard for tomorrow. Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm #Nigeria #LettersFromStockholm #KioAmachree #IllegalFishing #ForeignTrawlers #NigerDelta #MarineConservation #FoodSecurity #BlueEconomy #EnvironmentalProtection #FishingIndustry #NigeriaEconomy #Accountability Research supporting the article The principal sources include the 2019 peer-reviewed study on Nigerian fish-stock depletion , the 2025 Premium Times investigation , the February 2026 fishermen’s warning , and the 2026 fisheries assessment documenting production shortfalls and economic losses . The historical $600 million loss estimate comes from THISDAY , while the environmental consequences of bottom trawling are documented by the Environmental Justice Foundation . The strongest evidence concerns seabed damage, declining fish stocks and the destruction of juvenile fish. Specific claims about the scale of coral reef destruction in Nigerian waters require further scientific verification.

LOVE OF COUNTRY IS WHY I WILL NOT BE SILENT By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm I take no pleasure in writing, week after week, about the failure of Nigeria's government and its president. I would rather write about a country making progress: institutions earning trust, leaders respecting public money, citizens facing the future with confidence. But love of country does not permit me to manufacture praise where the numbers show ruin. Silence would be easier. It would also be a betrayal. So let me state my judgment plainly, and then let me prove it. **The numbers do not lie. The spokesmen do.** When Bola Tinubu took office, Nigeria's total public debt stood at N87.38 trillion as of June 30, 2023. Three years later, it reached N166.79 trillion as of June 30, 2026, or $120.93 billion in dollar terms. The debt has nearly doubled in one term. That is not reform. That is a mortgage on our grandchildren signed without their consent. What does that debt cost? According to the World Bank's October 2026 update, the Federal Government spent N7.7 trillion on interest payments in the first half of 2026, representing 124.2 per cent of its total revenue of N6.2 trillion. Read that again. For every N100 Nigeria earned, it paid N124 in interest alone. Interest payments exceeded the government's revenue by N1.5 trillion between January and June. The IMF puts the full-year picture at 53.7 percent of government revenue consumed by interest in 2026, up from 40.8 percent in 2024. And still the borrowing continues: in April 2026, President Tinubu requested the National Assembly approve over $6 billion in new foreign loans, while the DMO plans to offer N5.75 trillion in FGN bonds in the fourth quarter of 2026 alone. And the people? The World Bank projected that the poverty rate would reach 62 percent in 2026, 141 million poor Nigerians. In 2018/19 the Nigeria Living Standards Survey estimated poverty at 40%, or 81 million people. Sixty million more Nigerians have fallen into poverty in seven years, the majority of them under this presidency. The government's response was not to act but to argue. Minister Sunday Dare cautioned against interpreting the World Bank's number as a literal, real-time headcount. The hungry are not a headcount to this government. They are a public-relations problem. Yes, headline inflation has eased; it fell to 14.63% in September 2026, the lowest level since October 2020. The presidency will wave that figure like a trophy. But inflation falling means prices are rising more slowly, not that they are falling. The average retail price of petrol in May 2026 was ₦1,596.25, a 55.31% increase from ₦1,027.76 in May 2025. The legal minimum wage is still N70,000. That wage could buy only 43.9 litres of petrol in May 2026. A full month's labour for less than one tank of fuel, in a country that produces oil. Labour's negotiating council called a three-day warning strike from 2 to 4 October 2026 demanding petrol cut to N500 a litre. That is what "Renewed Hope" looks like from the ground. **While the people tighten their belts, the palace loosens its own.** Less than two weeks after thousands took to the streets to protest rising hunger, the president departed for France on a newly acquired Airbus A330. Premium Times and Punch reported the jet was purchased for over $100 million, brokered by L & L International of Miami; the administration never revealed the price. The 2026 budget allocated N283.85 billion for presidential air fleet logistics and management, including the national forest guard, against N12.7 billion earmarked for the presidential air fleet in the 2023 supplementary budget. The same budget found N7 billion for solar energy systems at the State House. The vice president's lodge was allocated additional funds bringing the cost of construction to ₦21 billion. Civic trackers found that the 2026 budget provides nearly ₦1 trillion ($703 million) for SUVs and empowerment projects, in a budget projected to run a deficit of about 46 percent financed through fresh borrowing. We are borrowing money to buy jeeps. Then there is the Lagos–Calabar Coastal Highway. The Federal Executive Council awarded phase one to Hitech Construction Company, founded by Gilbert Chagoury, a Lebanese-Nigerian businessman who Tinubu said assisted him to "tame the Atlantic" when he was governor of Lagos. Atiku Abubakar called out the government for awarding the contract without competitive bidding and challenged the president to disclose the full cost. The government's own figures keep moving: Minister Umahi first claimed N4bn per kilometre, implying a total of N2.8trn, then confirmed the project would tentatively cost N15.36tn or N4.39bn per kilometre, and more recently has been defending a ₦7.5 billion per kilometre cost. A 700-kilometre road handed to a presidential friend without a tender, at a price nobody in government can state twice the same way. In any serious democracy that alone would end a career. **The allegations will not be insulted away.** A federal court in Chicago has already compelled the FBI and DEA to release records concerning the president's past in the United States. Whatever those records ultimately show, a head of state who respected his office would have welcomed full disclosure. Instead, Nigerians get Bayo Onanuga and Daniel Bwala calling citizens who ask questions "wailers" and "agents of the opposition." Presidential spokesmen cannot settle allegations of corruption by abusing the people asking. They can only be settled by documents, independent investigators and open courts. **Where is the National Assembly?** The Senate did not merely wave through the president's N58.18 trillion proposal; it passed a N68.3trn 2026 budget, adding N9.09trn of its own. Lawmakers who began this term by confirming that more than 460 federal lawmakers would each get SUVs reportedly worth more than $150,000 each have no moral standing to lecture anyone about sacrifice. Oversight committees that produce no published findings are not oversight. They are theatre. Legislators are paid to defend the public interest. They should remember who pays them, and that it is not the Villa. **And the security services?** Their allegiance belongs to the Constitution, not to a president, his family or his business associates. A DSS or police that treats journalists, protesters and opposition organisers as enemies of the state while contractors walk free has inverted its oath. Citizens demanding accountability are entitled to protection, not surveillance. **Exhaustion is not consent.** I know Nigeria well enough to fear what happens when those in power mistake public exhaustion for approval. People can endure hardship for a long time. Their patience is not unlimited. A leadership that flaunts $100 million jets and trillion-naira SUV budgets while telling a N70,000 worker to wait for a better tomorrow is not governing. It is provoking. **What must happen now.** I do not believe Nigerians should accept another Tinubu term. Nor am I impressed that the APC has waived the screening requirement for President Bola Tinubu ahead of the 2027 elections; a party that will not even vet its own candidate has told you what it thinks of accountability. His answer to the opposition was to joke that "They want to scare me off? It's a lie". Nobody is trying to scare him. We are trying to retire him, lawfully, at the ballot box. But the opposition must earn it. The ADC coalition of Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi and Rotimi Amaechi has so far offered Nigerians a contest of ambitions, not a programme. Oshiomhole mocked Atiku as the APC's "best campaign manager" for attacking Obi, and he was not entirely wrong. If the coalition cannot agree a candidate, a manifesto and a published anti-corruption plan within months, it will deserve the defeat it is courting. A different collection of powerful men is not change. My demands are specific. Investigate every allegation of wrongdoing through an independent body outside presidential control. Publish the coastal highway contract, every variation and every payment to Hitech. Publish the price of the A330. Publish the debt-service schedule for every loan taken since May 2023. Recover stolen assets wherever wrongdoing is proved, and prosecute through fair trials. Office, wealth and friendship with the president must offer no immunity. I will not pretend that everything is well because speaking plainly makes powerful people uncomfortable. Nigeria's reputation is not defended by silencing critics. It is defended by confronting wrongdoing and building institutions worthy of respect. I write because I love my country. I write because 141 million Nigerians in poverty deserve better than a presidency that treats the treasury as a private account and the people as a nuisance. Tinubu must go, through the democratic process. Anyone found to have abused public office must face justice. Nigeria belongs to its people. Those entrusted with power must answer to them.

LETTERS FROM STOCKHOLM Behind Nigeria's Locked Doors: Torture, Illegal Detention and the Abuse of State Power Under Tinubu By Kio Amachree There is a side of Nigeria that the government would rather the international community did not examine too closely. It is not the presidential aircraft, the official motorcades or the expensive international conferences. It is what happens behind the locked doors of police stations, intelligence facilities, military detention centres and Nigerian prisons. People are arrested without proper justification. Suspects are held for weeks or months without appearing before a judge. Families struggle to discover where their relatives have been taken. Detainees describe being beaten, threatened, tortured into making confessions and forced to pay money for their freedom. These are not simply rumours circulating on Nigerian social media. They are documented allegations and findings from Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the United Nations system, the European Union Agency for Asylum and Nigeria's own National Human Rights Commission. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu assumed office on 29 May 2023. More than three years later, the evidence shows that serious abuses by Nigerian security institutions have continued under his administration. The question is no longer whether Nigeria has a problem with torture and arbitrary detention. The evidence establishes that it does. The questions are how extensive the abuses are, why accountability remains so limited, and what the federal and state authorities are doing to stop them. 1. The scale of Nigeria's human rights crisis National Human Rights CommissionHuman rights complaints, 20253,724,822 Across 38 NHRC officesComplaints, September 2026338,810 NHRC thematic categoryComplaints involving law enforcement and human dignity, August 202692,144 EU Agency for Asylum reportingPrisoners awaiting trial, March 2025About 2 in 3 Sources: NHRC annual and monthly dashboards; European Union Agency for Asylum. These figures cover different categories and periods and must not be added together. 📷 National Human Rights Commission +3 The National Human Rights Commission recorded more than 3.7 million human rights complaints in 2025. Its September 2026 dashboard alone recorded 338,810 complaints. These figures include many forms of abuse, such as discrimination, insecurity, violence against women and children, and infringements of civil and political rights. They are not figures for confirmed torture victims or illegal detainees, and complaints are not equivalent to judicial findings. Nevertheless, the scale of reporting is significant. In August 2026, the commission recorded 92,144 complaints in its category concerning law enforcement and human dignity. It also reported visiting 103 detention facilities and five military formations that month. A government committed to eliminating torture should be able to publish credible national figures showing how many allegations have been investigated, how many officers have been prosecuted, how many victims have received compensation and how many unlawful detention facilities have been closed. Those figures should be readily available for public scrutiny. 📷 National Human Rights Commission +2 2. Tiger Base: What Amnesty International discovered in Imo State One of the most disturbing investigations published during Tinubu's presidency concerns the Nigerian Police Anti-Kidnapping Unit in Owerri, Imo State, popularly known as Tiger Base. On 25 February 2026, Amnesty International published an investigation describing alleged torture, unlawful detention, extortion, enforced disappearances and deaths in custody. Former detainees described being beaten with iron rods, electrical cables, batons and whips. Some reported being attacked with knives and machetes. Others described being suspended with ropes and left bleeding. Amnesty documented accounts of people held for weeks or months without charge, sometimes without even being properly questioned about the offences they supposedly committed. One former detainee described being held while police demanded millions of naira from his family as the price of his freedom. Another described people being taken away from their cells and never returning. The physical conditions were equally alarming. Amnesty reported that cells measuring approximately 12 feet by 12 feet sometimes held more than 70 people, with inadequate ventilation, overflowing toilets and insufficient space to sit. The investigation also documented the death of security guard Japhet Njoku in May 2025. His family was reportedly told that he had been beaten to death in detention, while attempts to establish the cause through a court-ordered autopsy encountered repeated obstacles. These are findings and allegations documented by Amnesty, not criminal convictions against every officer implicated. Nevertheless, they demand independent investigation and accountability. Tiger Base was established before Tinubu became president. Its alleged abuses therefore cannot all be attributed to his administration. But the continuation of such practices during his presidency raises an important question about federal oversight of the Nigeria Police Force. How can a country claim to respect the rule of law when a police unit can allegedly operate in this manner? 📷 Amnesty International +1 3. Thirty-seven detainees dead in Niger State In September 2026, Associated Press reported that 37 people suspected of illegal mining had died in custody at a Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps facility in Niger State. Families alleged that detainees had been beaten and mistreated. Survivors described overcrowding and deprivation of basic necessities. According to the report, 67 individuals had been crowded into a single cell. There were allegations that suffocation contributed to the deaths, while officials initially suggested a disease outbreak. The federal government announced an investigation, 20 NSCDC personnel were suspended, and a committee was established to examine what happened. The final causes of death and individual criminal responsibility require independent forensic and judicial determination. But 37 people dying in state custody is an event that demands far more than a press statement. Every detainee, including a person suspected of a serious crime, remains entitled to humane treatment, medical care and due process. Arrest is not a death sentence. The families deserve the truth, and the public deserves to know whether the investigation produces prosecutions, disciplinary measures and compensation. 📷 AP News 4. The #EndBadGovernance protests: When citizens demanded relief In August 2024, Nigerians took to the streets to protest rising living costs, corruption and economic hardship. Amnesty International subsequently documented the killing of at least 24 protesters in six states and the arrest or detention of more than 1,200 people, including children. Some detainees faced treason-related charges. Others were held for extended periods in conditions that human rights organisations described as appalling. One of the most disturbing testimonies came from Khalid Aminu, who said he was arrested by the Department of State Services in Kaduna and tortured for more than 60 days. He described beatings with sticks and iron cables and said officers poured water on him. Another activist, Michael Adaramoye, was detained for approximately two months. The Nigerian Police Force denied allegations of unlawful killings and excessive force. But Amnesty International reported in August 2025 that no member of the security forces had been prosecuted for the 24 protest deaths it had documented. President Tinubu subsequently ordered the release of some detained children and an investigation into the officials responsible. That intervention was important, but it did not resolve the wider questions surrounding the arrests, detention conditions and deaths. What happened to the officers accused of shooting protesters? What compensation was paid to bereaved families? How many allegations of torture resulted in prosecutions? Citizens protesting economic hardship should not have to fear being treated as enemies of the state. 📷 Amnesty International +2 5. The DSS, military detention and the problem of disappearing civilians The Department of State Services is responsible for national security, not for operating outside the Constitution. Yet allegations of prolonged incommunicado detention continue to emerge. On 18 October 2026, The Guardian reported testimony from families and survivors concerning alleged arbitrary arrests, torture and disappearances in southeastern Nigeria. Some families described spending years searching police stations, military barracks and detention centres for relatives. One case involved Ozioma Elizabeth Onyeaka, reportedly missing since 2021, whose family learned in June 2026 that she was alive and detained at Wawa Barracks in Niger State. Another involved Sunday Ifedi and his wife, Calista, arrested in 2021. Sunday was eventually released after more than four years, while Calista was reported to have died in custody. Other families described relatives taken away by security operatives and subsequently denied contact with lawyers or family members. Many of these arrests originated under the Buhari administration, and their individual circumstances require verification. But unresolved detention and disappearance cases remain the responsibility of the institutions holding the detainees and of the government currently overseeing those institutions. The British government's April 2026 country assessment also recorded allegations of prolonged detention, torture and enforced disappearances involving suspected pro-Biafra supporters. It noted some reported releases following a DSS case review under the Tinubu administration. That demonstrates that intervention is possible. It also raises the question of why every detention case cannot be subjected to transparent legal review. 📷 guardian.ng +1 6. Journalists and critics are not exempt There is another troubling aspect of the problem: the use of criminal processes against people who criticise those in authority. Human Rights Watch's 2026 World Report documented arrests and prosecutions of journalists, activists and social media commentators, including cases brought under Nigeria's cybercrime legislation. Activist Omoyele Sowore alleged that he was assaulted and tortured while detained in August 2025. The police denied the torture allegation. Human rights lawyer Dele Farotimi was detained for weeks following his arrest in 2024 over allegations arising from his published criticism of a prominent lawyer. The complainant later withdrew his petition, and the charges were dropped. Journalists and online commentators in Lagos and Kwara also faced arrests or criminal proceedings following critical publications. More recently, the Media Foundation for West Africa reported that journalist Lawrence Zongo was arrested by military personnel in Jos on 5 October 2026 while visiting injured relatives at a military medical facility. According to its 12 October report, he was being held without charge and without access to family or legal representation. His subsequent status requires confirmation. The principle should be straightforward: criticism of government is not, by itself, a crime. Where a genuine criminal allegation exists, the authorities must follow the law rather than use detention as punishment before trial. 📷 Human Rights Watch +1 7. The prisons: Where detention becomes punishment before conviction Nigeria's correctional system is another part of this crisis. The European Union Agency for Asylum reported that, as of March 2025, approximately 77,800 people were held in Nigeria's prisons, with around two-thirds awaiting trial. That means roughly 52,000 people had not been convicted of the offences for which they were being held. Not every person awaiting trial is unlawfully detained. Courts may authorise pretrial detention in appropriate circumstances. But such a large remand population places enormous pressure on an already struggling correctional system. The United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture inspected Nigerian detention facilities in September 2024 and described conditions in most of those visited as abysmal. Problems included overcrowding, poor sanitation, inadequate food and medical care, and insufficient safeguards against mistreatment. These conditions are particularly dangerous for people who are elderly, ill or detained for extended periods without effective access to legal representation. The European Union's 2026 country guidance continues to identify torture, arbitrary detention and harsh prison conditions as potential risks for particular groups in Nigeria. 📷 European Union Agency for Asylum +1 8. Nigeria already has laws prohibiting torture There is no legal justification for torture in Nigeria. Section 34 of the 1999 Constitution protects the dignity of the human person and prohibits torture and inhuman or degrading treatment. Section 35 protects personal liberty and establishes safeguards concerning arrest and detention. The Anti-Torture Act of 2017 expressly prohibits torture, while Nigeria is also bound by international human rights obligations. The problem is enforcement. The World Organisation Against Torture reported in its 2026 Nigeria assessment that torture and ill-treatment remain widespread concerns across police, military and other security operations. It identified weak investigations, poor detention records, inadequate independent monitoring and very limited accountability for perpetrators. The United States Department of State's 2024 human rights report similarly described impunity for torture as a significant problem, particularly involving the police, military and DSS. In other words, Nigeria does not principally suffer from a shortage of legal protections. It suffers from the failure to ensure those protections are respected in practice. 📷 ecoi.net +1 9. What the Tinubu administration must account for It would be inaccurate to suggest that torture began when Tinubu became president. Nigeria's history of police brutality, military detention and abuses by security agencies extends across successive administrations. It would also be inaccurate to suggest that every detention is unlawful or that every allegation against a security officer has been proved. But neither point excuses the continuation of documented abuses. The President heads the federal executive, and the Nigeria Police Force, DSS and other federal security institutions operate within a framework of federal authority and legal accountability. Tinubu's administration therefore has a responsibility to ensure that credible allegations are investigated and that the law is enforced. There should be an independently supervised national audit of police cells, DSS detention facilities, military holding centres and correctional institutions. Every person held should be identifiable through an accurate custody register. Families and lawyers should be able to establish where detainees are held, subject only to lawful and narrowly justified restrictions. Every death in custody should trigger an independent investigation, with appropriate forensic examination and public reporting. Every credible allegation of torture should be investigated, and officers against whom sufficient evidence exists should face prosecution. And every person unlawfully detained should have access to judicial remedies and appropriate compensation. These are not extraordinary demands. They are elementary requirements of constitutional government. 10. The international consequences Nigeria's treatment of detainees is not merely a domestic matter. European asylum authorities already assess the risk of torture, arbitrary detention and degrading prison conditions when examining claims involving particular categories of Nigerian applicants. The British government's 2026 country guidance likewise recognises circumstances in which individuals associated with separatist movements may face serious harm from state authorities. Such assessments do not mean every Nigerian faces persecution or that all Nigerians abroad are affected equally. They do mean that the conduct of Nigerian security institutions forms part of the international documentary record used by foreign governments and courts. A country seeking international investment, diplomatic respect and stronger security partnerships should be prepared to demonstrate that its own security agencies operate under the rule of law. 📷 European Union Agency for Asylum +1 Conclusion: The right to freedom cannot depend on the goodwill of a police officer I have spent much of my life studying politics, law and the exercise of state power. One principle remains fundamental: the authority to arrest a citizen is one of the most serious powers a government possesses. That authority must never become a licence to torture, extort, intimidate or disappear people. The cases documented under Tinubu's presidency raise serious questions about the conduct of Nigerian security institutions and the effectiveness of civilian oversight. The victims are not statistics. They are fathers, mothers, students, journalists, traders and ordinary citizens whose families may spend months or years trying to obtain answers. Nigeria cannot build a credible constitutional democracy while people fear that an encounter with security agents could lead to unlawful detention, physical abuse or disappearance. President Tinubu's government should publish the number of torture complaints received since May 2023, the number independently investigated, the prosecutions and convictions secured, the deaths recorded in federal custody and the remedies provided to victims. The public should not have to rely entirely on human rights organisations to discover what happens inside institutions maintained with public money. A government that demands obedience to the law must first demonstrate that its own agents obey it. And no Nigerian should lose their freedom, their dignity or their life merely because someone wearing a uniform believes they have the power to take it away. Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm #Nigeria #HumanRights #EndPoliceBrutality #StopTorture #RuleOfLaw #JusticeForAll #TinubuAdministration #DSS #PoliceReform #Accountability #LettersFromStockholm

The Cost of the Throne: What Tinubu's Jets, Boats and Cars Add Up To By Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm Nigerians have been told to tighten their belts. The subsidy went. The naira was floated and sank. Food inflation emptied the pot. "Bear the pain," they said, "a better tomorrow is coming." I have been digging into what the people giving that advice spent on themselves while Nigerians bore the pain. Here is the ledger, drawn from published reporting, and I will say at the outset that every figure is attributed and every denial is noted. Judge for yourself. Start in the sky. The Airbus A330 that replaced the old Boeing 737 was reported at roughly one hundred million dollars to buy, with a further fifty million in retrofits, which is to say something in the region of one hundred and fifty billion naira. The Presidency has never published the price; Bayo Onanuga's only answer was that it was bought "far below the market price." Below the market price of what, and paid to whom, we are not told. Then comes the cost of keeping the fleet in the air: about twenty-six billion naira in operations and maintenance in the first eighteen months, a further four point two billion through late 2025, and nineteen billion on engine overhauls across three years. Sahara Reporters put the cumulative jet bill at around one hundred and seventy-nine billion naira. One aircraft, one presidency, three years. Now the water. The five point one billion naira presidential yacht sits in the Navy's books, ordered under Buhari, delivered to Nigeria, and, when Senator Ndume last spoke of it, signed for but not paid for. The National Assembly struck it from the supplementary budget and moved the money to student loans. The Presidency insists Tinubu never asked for it and the Navy calls it an operational boat for training and inspection. Fine. Then let the Navy publish who ordered it, who built it, where it is berthed and who has sailed on it. A boat that nobody requested, nobody paid for and nobody will claim is still a boat the Nigerian taxpayer is on the hook for. Now the road. Six point nine billion naira for State House vehicles. One point five billion for cars for a First Lady whose office does not exist in the constitution. One point five billion for bulletproof Mercedes. And, in a single ten-day window, three point seven billion naira spent at Aso Rock on vehicles and tyres. Tyres. I have run businesses on three continents and I have never seen a tyre bill like it. Now the houses. Forty point six billion naira to renovate Aso Villa in 2024. Seven billion for the Lagos residences of the President and Vice-President. Nearly four billion for Dodan Barracks. Six point four billion more for quarters in the 2025 budget. These are men who already live in the most expensive real estate the Nigerian state owns, and the state keeps paying to make it more comfortable. Add it up, jets, boats, cars and renovations, and you arrive at something between three hundred and three hundred and fifty billion naira in what I will call the prestige category. I will not pretend that number transforms Nigeria. Set against the 2025 health budget of two point four eight trillion and the education budget of three point five two trillion, it is about twelve percent of one year's health allocation, or ten percent of education. But let us be precise about what that twelve percent means in a country where only about forty percent of health capital funds are actually disbursed. The hospitals do not get the money that is budgeted for them. The Presidential Air Fleet gets its money, every time, on time, with engine overhauls thrown in. That is not a budget. That is a statement of priorities. I will give the Presidency its two best arguments, because I am not interested in cheap points. First, the yacht was a Buhari-era naval request, not a Tinubu whim. Second, the old 737 was nineteen years old and did break down mid-trip, including the oxygen leak in the Netherlands that forced the President onto a chartered Falcon. A head of state needs a safe aircraft. I accept both. Neither answers the question. The question is whether a nation telling its citizens to eat less should spend one hundred and fifty million dollars on a single aircraft, in cash, without disclosing the price, and then keep spending tens of billions a year to maintain it, while the man it carries spends a reported two hundred and sixty-one days abroad. A safe aircraft could have been bought for a fraction of that. A safe aircraft could have been leased. A safe aircraft did not require a second home in Lagos, a third in Dodan Barracks, and a tyre bill the size of a state hospital. What strikes me most, from Stockholm, is not the money. It is the reflex. Every time one of these items surfaces, the answer from Aso Rock is the same three words: it was inherited, it was necessary, it was below market. Nobody publishes a contract. Nobody publishes an invoice. Nobody says who the vendor was or who the agent was or what commission changed hands. In Sweden a minister who bought a bottle of wine on a government card lost her job. In Nigeria the President buys a wide-body jet and his spokesman tells the country to be grateful. The Kio Solution asks for five things. One. Publish the purchase contract, price and vendor for the A330, and the retrofit contracts, line by line. Two. Publish the full maintenance and charter ledger of the Presidential Air Fleet since May 2023, including every private charter and who paid. Three. Let the Navy name the yacht's builder, its location, its current status of payment, and every voyage it has made. Four. Let the Auditor-General and the Public Procurement Bureau audit every State House vehicle and renovation contract from 2023 to 2026, with the report laid before the National Assembly and published. Five. Freeze all further prestige spending at the Villa until health capital disbursement reaches at least eighty percent of what is appropriated. None of this is an accusation of theft. Every figure above is from published reporting; every denial is recorded; no court has found anyone guilty of anything. But a government that will not show the receipts should not expect the people paying for the jet to believe it was a bargain. Nothing personal. It is politics. Nigeria belongs to Nigerians. #Tinubu #AsoRock #PresidentialJet #Nigeria #Accountability #LettersFromStockholm #TheKioSolution #KioAmachree

Letters from Stockholm: Tinubu’s Reputation Has a Cost—and Nigerians Pay It By Kio Amachree A president’s reputation does not stop at the gates of the presidential palace. It travels with the country’s name, enters discussions with foreign investors and helps shape how the world views its institutions. When that reputation is surrounded by unresolved controversies, ordinary citizens have reason to ask what it is costing them. Under Bola Tinubu, that question deserves a serious answer. In September 2026, international reporting again placed Nigeria’s president alongside an American investigation into a Chicago heroin-trafficking operation. Reporting on an FBI declaration confirmed that Tinubu had been a subject of the investigation. The controversy includes the 1993 civil forfeiture of $460,000. Tinubu denies wrongdoing; neither the forfeiture nor the present records-disclosure proceedings constitute a criminal conviction against him. Those distinctions matter. So does the extraordinary burden of having these issues repeatedly associated with Nigeria’s presidency. My judgment is that this continuing controversy damages Nigeria’s credibility. A president should help his citizens overcome suspicion abroad. Nigerians should not have to explain away their president’s history while trying to establish their own honesty. The difficulties facing travellers are measurable. European Commission figures show a 45.9 per cent refusal rate for Schengen visa applications lodged in Nigeria in 2024, compared with 40.8 per cent in 2023. Almost half were refused. These figures concern applications lodged in Nigeria; they are not a measurement of Tinubu’s personal influence on consular decisions. Nevertheless, they expose the scale of the barriers confronting people seeking access to Europe. America’s restrictions have also become severe. Its December 2025 proclamation suspended entry for affected Nigerians in immigrant and several visitor, student and exchange categories, subject to exceptions and its application rules. Washington cited security and screening difficulties, alongside visa overstays. It did not identify Tinubu’s personal scandals as the reason. We should be precise about responsibility without becoming indifferent to the consequences. Restrictions can separate families, disrupt education and prevent entrepreneurs from meeting customers or attending trade events. The honest applicant bears the cost of national problems he or she did not create. Business confidence presents another warning. The US State Department’s 2025 investment assessment identifies corruption as a serious obstacle to Nigeria’s economic growth and a significant barrier cited by domestic and foreign investors. Transparency International’s 2025 index gives Nigeria 26 out of 100, ranking it 142nd of 182 countries for perceived public-sector corruption. These are assessments of institutions and governance, not accusations against every Nigerian. For a legitimate Nigerian business, the danger is that concern about the country becomes hesitation about the company. More verification, slower negotiations and reluctance to commit money are plausible consequences of distrust. No credible evidence allows us to calculate how many contracts Tinubu’s personal reputation has cost. But a presidency repeatedly defending itself against damaging historical allegations hardly strengthens the national argument for transparency. Nor did international concern begin with these allegations. The European Union’s observers concluded that shortcomings in Nigeria’s 2023 elections damaged trust in INEC. Nigeria’s credibility problem extends to how power is obtained, exercised and scrutinised. There has been progress worth acknowledging: FATF removed Nigeria from increased monitoring in October 2025 after improvements to its safeguards against illicit finance. That achievement demonstrates that institutional reform can repair international standing. It also makes continued demands for accountability more reasonable, not less. Nigeria’s difficulties predate Tinubu. Foreign governments also bear responsibility for unfair generalisations and disproportionate restrictions. Honest Nigerians deserve individual assessment, never collective suspicion. But Tinubu sought the presidency, and responsibility comes with it. His administration must answer legitimate questions, publish transparent accounts of public spending, strengthen credible institutions and negotiate practical improvements for citizens travelling and trading abroad. Nigerians should be able to present their passports and their business proposals with confidence. Their president owes them a reputation that helps open doors. #Nigeria #Tinubu #Accountability #NigerianDiaspora #InternationalTrade #LettersFromStockholm

Letters from Stockholm Tinubu Is No Napoleon. No President Is Invincible. By Kio Amachree Why do so many Nigerians continue to speak of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as though he were some invincible political genius, a man who cannot be defeated, challenged or removed from power? I have studied political history for most of my life, and I find this worship of Tinubu’s supposed political brilliance utterly ridiculous. Nothing about this ageing politician reminds me of Napoleon Bonaparte. Not his intellect, not his eloquence, not his leadership, not his strategic vision and certainly not his achievements. Napoleon commanded armies, transformed institutions, rewrote laws and changed the course of European history. Tinubu’s admirers want us to believe that manipulating political alliances, controlling party machinery and surrounding oneself with loyalists somehow constitutes comparable genius. Since when did political manipulation become a substitute for statesmanship? The greatest mistake Tinubu and his supporters can make is to confuse control of the political establishment with control of the Nigerian people. They are two entirely different things. I believe Tinubu’s greatest fear is not the opposition politicians he believes he can buy, intimidate or divide. His greatest fear should be the millions of ordinary Nigerians who have endured hunger, insecurity, unemployment and the humiliation of watching their country deteriorate. And I am increasingly convinced that the 2027 presidential election could become the defining political crisis of his career. I fear that Tinubu and his political machine will attempt to manipulate the election to secure another four years in office. But what happens if Nigerians believe their votes have once again been stolen? What happens when millions of citizens who can barely afford food, transport or electricity conclude that even the ballot box has been taken away from them? There is a limit to what any population will tolerate. I would not be surprised if a seriously disputed election produced a nationwide political crisis so severe that Tinubu found himself contemplating the familiar comforts of Paris rather than another four years in Aso Rock. That is a political prediction, not a call for violence. Nigeria has already buried far too many innocent citizens because of the ambitions of politicians. And this brings me to Judge Beryl Howell in Washington. The ongoing American litigation concerning FBI and DEA records relating to Tinubu’s past is potentially of enormous public importance. The American public record already includes the 1993 civil forfeiture of $460,000 connected to a narcotics investigation. That forfeiture was not a criminal conviction of Tinubu. Nevertheless, Nigerians deserve to know what the American authorities investigated, what their records contain and whether any additional relevant information can lawfully be released. If Judge Howell’s court proceedings result in the disclosure of significant new evidence, Nigerians should have that information before making another presidential decision. The truth could prove far more powerful than any political campaign. Perhaps full disclosure would even spare Nigeria the instability and possible loss of life that could follow another bitterly disputed election. But I want to make something absolutely clear. I do not believe Tinubu is invincible. I do not believe he possesses extraordinary political intelligence. And I certainly do not believe that he has some divine entitlement to govern Nigeria until he chooses to leave. History is littered with rulers who believed themselves indispensable. Some controlled armies. Others controlled the police, the courts, the treasury and the entire machinery of government. Yet they eventually discovered that power is temporary. Even Napoleon, a man of genuine military and political genius, ended his career in exile on a remote island in the South Atlantic. What makes Tinubu’s supporters imagine that their hero is somehow exempt from the lessons of history? I am convinced that his political dominance is far more fragile than his admirers realise. I also believe that the day will come when members of this administration will have to answer serious questions about public contracts, government expenditure, alleged corruption and the abuse of political power. Where evidence establishes criminal wrongdoing, those responsible should be investigated, prosecuted and, if convicted, imprisoned. No political office should provide permanent immunity from accountability. I do not want another military coup. I do not want bloodshed. I do not want Nigerians dying in the streets to remove politicians who should be removable through democratic institutions. I want a country in which elections cannot be stolen, public money cannot be looted with impunity and presidents understand that they are servants of the people, not their masters. My prediction is that Tinubu will face an enormous struggle to secure and sustain a second term. I cannot see his present political arrangement surviving indefinitely under the weight of public anger and disillusionment. The men surrounding him may believe that they are untouchable today. History suggests they should be considerably less confident. Nigeria is not Tinubu’s personal estate. Aso Rock is not his ancestral inheritance. And the Nigerian presidency is not a throne. Tinubu is no Napoleon. And even Napoleon was defeated. The question is not whether Tinubu is invincible. The question is how long Nigerians will continue to allow politicians to behave as though they are. Kio Amachree Letters from Stockholm #LettersFromStockholm #KioAmachree #Nigeria2027 #Tinubu #NigeriaPolitics #Democracy #RuleOfLaw #PoliticalAccountability #NigeriaDeservesBetter #EndCorruption #JusticeForNigeria