Res Ipsa loquitur
(The Fact Speaks for itself)
By Kunle Oyatomi
Eric Blair was an English novelist, poet and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell.
Best known for writing Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, Orwell once said: “However much you deny the truth, the truth goes on existing, as it were, behind your back.”
The agenda by some faceless Northerners to disparage President Bola Tinubu’s efforts at ensuring age-long divides, such as tribe and religion, are eradicated, is mindboggling.
Even though his predecessor, the late President Muhammadu Buhari, took those fault lines to an unenviable height, Tinubu has performed wonders in correcting them. No wonder some of the President’s biggest praise singers are the objective Northerners who recognise his attempt at ensuring inclusivity.
But like Ebenezer Obey says in the Horse, the Man and the Son, there is nothing Tinubu can do, critics will always complain, like Mr Bukar Mohammed.
If the President had not ensured balance and regional spread in his appointment, would a high-ranking senator like Mr Ali Ndume praise the President for ensuring inclusivity by appointing several Northerners to key positions within federal agencies? Or would some youths across the 19 Northern states, under the aegis of the Progressive Northern Youth Forum, PNYF, have celebrated his fairness in making strategic appointments?
Are the ministers of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Innovation, Science and Technology, Budget and Economic Planning, Foreign Affairs, Health & Social Welfare, Art, Culture & Creative Economy, Industry, Trade & Investment, who are positions central to a development plan, also from the President’s backyard?
On projects, which Mr Mohammed has failed to see from an informed perspective. Let it be known that like other regions, the South-East has not been left behind by the Tinubu administration. Early this year, specifically March 25, 2025, the Federal Government commenced the construction of Phase 2B of the access road to the Second Niger Bridge. The project is a 17.55 km expressway linking the bridge to major arterial roads in Anambra.
Before then, in February 2024, the Tinubu administration also launched the Light Up Nigeria Project – South East initiative to boost economic growth and industrial revival in the region.
Just a month ago, this administration also commissioned a world-class oncology centre in Nsukka, Enugu State, even though it had inaugurated a Cancer Centre of Excellence at the David Umahi Federal University of Health Sciences, DUFUHS, Uburu, in March.
Less than two months ago, the President further approved the establishment of the South-East Investment Company, SEIC, with an initial take-off capital of N150 billion to drive private capital, accelerate industrialisation and enhance competitiveness in the South-East.
Corruption, which is an entrenched phenomenon that has taken Nigeria 1000 steps backwards, did not start under the Tinubu administration.
The only mistake the President has made is trying to put an end to it. In just two years, the success he has recorded can be seen in Transparency International’s CPI score in which Nigeria has moved from 25 to 26.
That margin, no matter how small, is an indication of progress, a step towards restoring credibility, strengthening institutions and proving that reform, though slow, is possible when the will is there.
For people like Mr Bukar Mohammed, who choose to find fault with the President rather than encourage him, I leave them with 2Shotz and 9ice’s hit single: whatever they like, they can say.
The truth is, Nigeria’s social and economic problems did not start today; they began a long time ago. Therefore, the President must be given credit for taking steps to restore the country to its path of glory.
Oyatomi, Former Editor (Sunday Vanguard), Author (FINGERPRINTS 2008) and a Lawyer, is a member of the Board of Independent Media and Policy Initiative (IMPI), a Think Tank based in Abuja.
