When Government Alienates, Distracts Itself

By Alabi Williams Posted 14 Jul 2025

More than one year to official announcement of campaigns for 2027 elections, politicians by themselves have flagged off the process. Campaign posters of President Bola Tinubu have since taken over the highways leading to airports in Lagos and Abuja. Loyalists and contractors of government are scrambling for every available space to confess their loyalty.

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The airwaves are jammed with self-serving narratives, as opposition politicians and government spokespersons trade allegations, tell barefaced lies and even expose their well-kept secretes. They’re not addressing the yawning governance gaps and the urgency needed to rescue the drifting state craft. The main business of government has long been abandoned.

This government made it known from day one that it coveted a second term. That mindset was not instigated by a mastery of the terrain and proper review of the poor performance it met on ground. The socio-economic situation President Tinubu inherited, which he had been part of, was not one to play politics with: the state of insecurity posed grave danger to the country, just as living standards had plummeted scandalously. It was not a time to fiddle while the country burns. But Tinubu started playing politics with serious issues as soon as he was inaugurated.

His first major recruitments into government did not reflect the federal character principle. President Tinubu surrounded himself with handpicked, core loyalists for sensitive roles, which angered some segments across the country, including the chieftains of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Buhari was accused of the same insularity, but he got away with it. The point is that on his way to garnering support for a second term, as recent events have shown, Tinubu may pay for his disregard for segments in the APC coalition, particularly those of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC).

Prominent and foundation members of APC have enlisted in emerging coalitions to trouble Tinubu. Perhaps, the celebrated master strategist failed to broaden his horizon after he thought he had captured power. He alienated former allies, whom his spokespersons rashly claim do not matter and will not matter in 2027.

The CPC segment, through former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Mustapha, has tacitly reminded the Tinubu camp the amount of votes the APC coalition brought into the basket in 2015 was not significant enough, compared with Buhari’s 12.4 million single-handed haul.

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The situation in the APC family today, is like the two camps have drawn the battleline. But all things considered, this is not an argument that could favour a ruling party that has become very unpopular. We cannot deny the collective push the coalition gave to Buhari in 2015. Buhari’s three previous solo efforts could not win him the presidency, until Tinubu threw his weight to rally the coalition. But that is no excuse for spokespersons of government to vituperate and further alienate their principal.

Also, the strategy to appoint a major political disruptor to head the Ministry of Federal Capital Territory was deft, as far as political gamesmanship is concerned. It was not borne out of Tinubu’s love for the opposition or for a nationalistic urge to form a government of unity. It was designed to further balkanise the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from within.

Nyesom Wike had sufficiently degraded the party in the 2023 elections. What remained was to consolidate the stranglehold and render the PDP useless in future elections. In the first two years of this government, Wike was able to inflict more damage on the PDP while he refused to decamp to APC, where he is an influential member of Tinubu’s cabinet.

In the history of democracy in the country, the insidious collabo between Tinubu and Wike has no parallel. Wike has one leg in the PDP and the other leg in government. He has access to federal power and resources while he remains a senior member of the PDP. He owns the interim leadership of the party and cannot be called to order. If Wike were not appointed minister after he completed his two terms as governor, he would have been defanged considerably, but that’s not the case.

Wike is the single most influential politician in Rivers as of today. He controls the state Legislature and has stolen the reins of authority from his successor, Siminalayi Fubara, whose suspension from office he engineered. Wike boasted that he wanted Fubara impeached but President Tinubu opted for the emergency rule. Whenever the next local government elections take place, Wike will nominate all contestants as he had done since he became governor. Wike has done to Rivers what Tinubu has done to Lagos: total capture.

The backlash: The efforts (planning, time and resources) invested to weaken the opposition have blinded the administration’s capacity to focus on governance. As the opposition was put in chains for two years, the ruling party inadvertently tied itself on one spot, unable to shake off the temptation to dominate the political space. In other words, this government distracted itself from delivering good governance to Nigerians by engaging power mongering and looking for opposition states and territories to capture.

Instead of hitting the ground running and scoring high on citizens’ welfare, Tinubu imposed the harshest of economic policies in the country’s history. Instead of showing compassion and demonstrating exemplary leadership, this government has wallowed in unrestrained pleasure and self-aggrandisement. He alienated the suffering masses.

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Now the chickens have come home to roost. The Nigeria Social Cohesion Survey 2025 report, conducted by the Africa Polling Institute (API), last week, showed a growing citizens’ distrust and low public confidence in this government and its institutions. According to the poll, 83 per cent of Nigerians expressed having little or no trust in the government of President Bola Tinubu, just as 82 per cent expressed same sentiments for the National Assembly. On the judiciary, 79 per cent said they had little or no confidence in the arm, under the previous and present leadership.

The report revealed that the state of cohesion in the country is very weak. Instead of gravitating towards common issues of patriotism and nationalism, the report found Nigerians moving towards shared struggles and their daily toil – economic hardship, high cost of transportation and lack of economic prosperity under the Tinubu administration.

To give credibility and a sense of fairness to the outcome of the survey, the API partnered Ford Foundation, in the nation-wide Citizens Perception Survey (CPS), to measure the state of social cohesion in the country between January and February 2025. A total of 5,465 interviews were conducted via face-to-face household visits, using the Stratified Random Sampling technique, with citizens aged 15 years and above. The interviews were conducted in five major languages; English, Pidgin, Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba and the geographical quota were assigned to ensure that all states and senatorial districts were proportionally represented in the sampling.

In today’s Tinubu economy, the market doesn’t recognise or differentiate among political parties. Neither do apologists of government get special retail prices as compensation for their blind loyalty. The soaring inflation rate touches every pocket. Electricity tariffs choke every consumer, particularly the SMEs.

In October 2024, Ibadan Electric Distribution Company (IBEDC), sold 158.98 units of electricity for N10,000. In June 2025, the same N10,000 fetches just 53.3 units, barely enough to power a frozen food SME for five days. The location in question is not in a Government Reserved Area or in a highbrow district of Lagos. It is in a remote setting where there is no government presence, apart from tax collectors. The tariffs thus vary, depending on how the Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, rates a location. And he’s still threatening increased tariff any time soon.

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In climes where surveys work, and where institutions of government work optimally and independently, a government lowly rated like Tinubu’s has to either decide to work extra hard to regain lost confidence or begin to plot an exit strategy. Nigerians are not difficult to manage and they don’t ask for much. But don’t take their resilience for granted. Right now, they’re disappointed and waiting.

A sensitive government should have called a retreat to do an assessment of the situation, with a commitment to spend the next one and a half years to recalibrate and deliver quality governance. But this government is too arrogant to do such. They would rather buy television airtime to award pass mark to themselves and traduce the opinion poll.

Despite the trillions made from the Tinubu tax (fuel subsidy savings), this government has very little to showcase. And that’s what the API survey has revealed. The rating is not good to take into election year. Though the time is short, government can find ways and means to return to the drawing board. The solution is not to invest massively in propaganda, as Nigerians are too wise now. All the promises Tinubu made since he became opposition leader in 2007, he has renounced in practical terms.

The removal of subsidy has not benefited the people. The policy may have benefited members of the National Assembly and state governments. The palliatives and social investment programmes funded with subsidy funds are not touching people at the base despite the propaganda by the IMF and World Bank.

Let the government stop punishing Nigerians for the sins of smugglers of petrol. The people deserve a little subsidy as an oil producing economy. Other oil producing countries implement subsidy programmes to protect the poor, control inflation and promote economic growth. Let this government tone down its rent-seeking and tax-loving appetite and protect poor Nigerians.

The cost of governance is too high. Nothing in the attitude of this government suggests that the economy is struggling. Profligacy in high places turns citizens away as they perceive leaders as cold and insensitive.

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Let the government be serious about fighting corruption. The FCT Minister, Wike, has made a passionate plea for Tinubu to release the report of the forensic audit ordered by the Buhari government to investigate the mismanagement of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), during the tenure of Godswill Akpabioas the Minster of Niger Delta. Perhaps, that’s a good place to start, to win back citizens’ trust.

Note: This article was first published by The Guardian Newspaper.
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