Nigeria’s political landscape is being reshaped before our very eyes. The chess pieces are moving across the board with calculated precision, as defections sweep across the nation like wildfire in the harmattan season. 

Make no mistake about it – we’re witnessing a high-stakes power play that threatens the very fabric of our democratic experiment.

Last month, Delta state governor Sheriff Oborevwori shocked the nation by defecting with his entire cabinet to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). As if that wasn’t dramatic enough, Delta lawmakers in the House of Representatives followed suit, effectively turning a PDP stronghold since 1999 into a one-party state overnight. The political tsunami didn’t end there.

There is a brewing coalition led by former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and former Kaduna state governor Nasir el-Rufai, purportedly aimed at unseating President Bola Tinubu come 2027. Presidential spokesman Daniel Bwala dismissively labelled these coalitions as mere “hallucinations,” insisting no credible political figure has endorsed such a move. But we know better, don’t we?

On the other side of the chessboard, President Tinubu isn’t sitting idly by. Sources close to the presidency reveal that at least five governors are poised to join Tinubu’s camp. It’s now a battle of coalitions – a political arms race where the currency is loyalty and the prize is power.

Have we paused to consider what this means for governance? While our politicians are busy playing musical chairs, the business of actual governance has been unceremoniously shoved aside. The media space is saturated with defection stories while pressing national issues gather dust on the shelf of neglect.

Nasarawa state governor Abdullahi Sule attempted to calm frayed nerves when he said, “We don’t even want Nigeria to be a one-party state. We just want to be the dominant party. If we can win 90 percent of the votes, that’s okay.” Let that sink in for a moment. A 90-10 split is what the APC considers healthy democracy. If that doesn’t set alarm bells ringing, I don’t know what will.

Former President Goodluck Jonathan, speaking at the memorial lecture for the late Edwin Clark, warned that creating a one-party state “through the backdoor by political manipulations” would inevitably lead to crisis.

He reminded us that while some countries have adopted single-party systems, those were meticulously designed with clear national objectives in mind – not cobbled together through opportunistic defections.

“Yes, countries have practiced a one-party system. It may not be evil after all,” Jonathan noted, citing Julius Nyerere of Tanzania who used a one-party state to stabilize the country in their early days of independence.

But there’s a world of difference between a carefully planned system and the chaotic power grab we’re witnessing.

The opposition coalition thinking that hardship caused by economic reforms is enough to unseat Tinubu in 2027 is engaging in wishful thinking of the highest order. Have we learned nothing from our political history?

Performance in office is just one factor in Nigeria’s complex electoral equation. Religion, ethnicity, party loyalty, and financial muscle play equally significant, if not more decisive, roles.

Let’s be brutally honest here: ethnicity and religion remain the twin towers that dominate our political skyline. After former President Muhammadu Buhari’s eight years, there’s an expectation that the south should have its eight years at the helm. We’re not yet politically mature enough to say our president can come from anywhere.

The opposition coalition must factor this reality into their calculations. Presenting Atiku, a Fulani northerner like Buhari, would be dead on arrival. They should abandon that notion if they’re serious about wresting power from Tinubu.

What’s particularly disheartening is the cowardice displayed by our politicians. Most can’t survive outside the corridors of power or without aligning with the center. That’s why the opposition is gradually withering away – they lack the backbone to stay the course and build a formidable alternative.

Ironically, President Tinubu himself was in opposition from 1999 to 2015, and his patience eventually paid dividends. Some of our faint-hearted politicians could learn a thing or two from his playbook. Politics isn’t a sprint; it’s a marathon that rewards endurance and strategic patience.

The real victims in this political chess game are the Nigerian people. While politicians calculate their next moves, the citizenry watches helplessly as their interests are sacrificed on the altar of political expediency. The opposition’s inability to provide a credible alternative forces voters into a Hobson’s choice – either vote for the dominant party or waste your ballot on fragmented opposition parties with little chance of victory.

Democracy thrives on competition. When one party becomes too dominant, accountability suffers, corruption flourishes, and governance deteriorates. The APC’s apparent strategy to absorb opposition figures isn’t just about strengthening their ranks – it’s about systematically dismantling any meaningful opposition. This should concern every Nigerian who values democratic principles.

As we approach 2027, we must ask ourselves: do we want a vibrant democracy with robust debate and genuine alternatives, or are we content with a pseudo-democratic one-party state?

The battle of coalitions we’re witnessing isn’t just about political survival; it’s about the soul of Nigerian democracy.

Our politicians need to develop some spine and stay to build the opposition instead of always running to the party at the centre at the first sign of political headwinds. After all, democracy isn’t a spectator sport – it demands active, principled participation from all stakeholders. The alternative is too grim to contemplate.

This article was necessitated by the events that took place on Tuesday, April 29, 2025, when the newly installed Alaafin of Oyo refused to stand up to greet the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, who had approached to exchange pleasantries with him and other monarchs at a programme organised by Nigeria’s First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu, in Ibadan, Oyo State. In a video that went viral on social media, the Alaafin remained seated and greeted the Ooni casually, while other traditional rulers stood up to shake hands with Oba Adeyeye.

I first saw the viral video on the Facebook profile of Adedamola Adetayo, a ‘ThinkYorubaFirst’ cultural ambassador. He captioned the video, ‘This is very bad optics. Indefensible. It’s a bad omen for Yorubaland.’

As expected, many latter-day historians weighed in on the matter. While some argued that the Alaafin disrespected the Ooni, who is acknowledged to be the spiritual head of the Yoruba race, others claimed that once seated at an event, it is a taboo for an Alaafin to stand up to greet anyone, no matter how highly placed that person was in the society. However, at that same event, the Alaafin was seen standing up to greet the First Lady, Mrs Oluremi Tinubu, and the Oyo state governor, Seyi Makinde.

The Alaafin’s personal assistant, Kolade Oladele, saw nothing wrong in the video. When asked for his reaction, he gave a lame, tepid and watery excuse, saying those reading meaning into the issues are making deliberate attempts to sow discord among Yoruba traditional rulers and distracting them from focusing on more pressing issues affecting the region, including insecurity, economic hardship, and youth development.

As a political expert whose knowledge of historical facts is limited, I couldn’t fault those who saw nothing wrong in the Alaafin’s action at the said event. However, deep down within me, I knew something was amiss, given the body language of the Alaafin and the way he fixed his gaze to the ground while the Ooni was walking to him to exchange pleasantries.

A few days later, the media became awash with reports that there was indeed a simmering rift between the two respected Yoruba monarchs which started in March 2025 when the Alaafin was doing his Ipebi (seclusion rites). The bone of contention was Oyotunji African Village in Beaufort County, South Carolina, United States. There were reports that the Ooni of Ife had always crowned the monarchs in the village, but the new Alaafin believed that the place was an Oyo territory and not Osun; therefore, the Ooni should not interfere in matters relating to the village.

Matters took a disturbing turn when it was reported that a Yoruba traditional ruler based in the United States, Chief Lukman Ojora Arounfale, the Baba Oba of Oyotunji African Village in South Carolina, was allegedly beaten at the palace of the Alaafin over the Oyotunji issue, and this led to his death. As usual, the Alaafin has denied any knowledge of the incident.

I find these developments so disturbing, especially for a monarch that was coronated just a month ago. Lest we forget, the ascension of Oba Owoade to the prestigious throne is currently being challenged in court by one of the contestants, Prince Lukman Gbadegesin. Also, five out of seven Oyomesis (kingmakers) said he was not their choice. They claimed they recommended Gbadegesin for the role. However, on January 10, Governor Makinde disapproved of their choice and presented Owoade with the staff of office as the new Alaafin. The governor even accused the kingmakers of collecting bribes and threatened to prosecute them. In the days of yore, the Oyo Mesi was made up of the most powerful noblemen in imperial Oyo. They constituted the electoral council and possess the legislative powers to carry out their duty. The seven councillors are (1) Bashorun, (2) Agbaakin, (3) Samu, (4) Alapinni, (5) Laguna, (6) Akiniku (7) Ashipa. No emperor, or Alaafin of Oyo, was capable of being enthroned in the capital without the prior consent of and performance of rituals by these seven titleholders. However, in today’s world, the government is the ‘Oyomesi’, and any other kingmaker who questions the authority of the constituted authority will have himself to blame.

Honestly, I don’t know the basis upon which the new Alaafin will see himself as co-equal with the Ooni. It beats my imagination how a king who was crowned in 2025 will be claiming rivalry with a monarch that was coronated in 2015. If you won’t respect his age, at least show respect for the fact that he is your senior. There is no basis for any rivalry whatsoever. Maybe such rivalry existed in times past when the monarchs were warlords, but with the advent of civilisation, the government recognises the Ooni of Ife over the Alaafin. While they are both highly respected and first-class monarchs, from the perspective of the federal government, the Ooni, being the spiritual head of the entire Yoruba race, is considered as the head of all Southern monarchs, just as the Sultan of Sokoto is considered as the head of all royal fathers in the North. It is just like the Emir of Kano or Emir of Borno dragging superiority with the Sultan of Sokoto.

A few days ago, many Yoruba people were shocked with the statement credited to the Oluwo of Iwo, Oba Abdulrosheed Akanbi, in which he accused the Ooni of Ife of plotting his downfall after he (Oluwo) helped him (Ooni) to mount the throne. But for the maturity and calm disposition of the Ooni, the matter would have degenerated into a major conflict. I would have expected Alaafin Owoade to use his position to broker peace not just between the two monarchs but also other royal fathers in the South-West. I wanted an Alaafin that will prioritise the need for Yoruba unity so as to jointly confront the myriads of challenges confronting us as a race and lead the Yoruba to national pre-eminence.

What are the roles of traditional rulers in modern-day Nigeria? Can the society survive without them? The answer is neither here nor there. To the government, the traditional rulers are non-state actors who exist at the pleasures of the politicians and can be dispensed with anytime. To the culturalists, the royal fathers are essential for the preservation of our culture and traditions. Alaafin Owoade should know that his title today is just ceremonial. In the olden days, an Alaafin could pronounce death on any of his subjects, and no one dared to question him. That is why they bear names and appellations such as Kabiyesi, which means the king no one can question; Iku Baba Yeye, meaning the one who can command death or pronounce the same upon his father or mother or he who is parent to death; and Alashe Ekeji Orisha, which means he who wields authority and is second-in-command to the gods.

Unlike in times past when the royal fathers were the governing authority, the Alaafin today cannot pronounce death on any of the subjects under his domain; that responsibility lies with the courts or judicial arm of government. Yorubas have a saying in the past, and it goes thus: ‘Oba loni ile; Oba ba lori ohun gbogbo (The king owns the land; the king rules over the affairs of everything). Any king who tries such in today’s Nigeria will have himself to blame.

Just last month, the Ogun State Government arraigned the Olu of Obafemi, Oba Taofeek Owolabi, before Justice Sunday Adeniyi of the state High Court, Abeokuta, for land grabbing. Oba Owolabi, a member of the Egba Traditional Council, is currently on suspension over the same allegation. In a statement by the Ministry of Justice, the royal father was said to have been arraigned on Tuesday “for conspiracy to sell property without authority, sale of property without authority, unlawful use of agents, forceful takeover of land, assault of a police officer, and obtaining by false pretence.” Apparently, the monarch thinks he has the powers wielded by his forefathers on the throne, forgetting that his position is just ceremonial. Also last month, Governor Monday Okpebholo of Edo State dethroned two traditional rulers—one over alleged complicity in kidnapping and another due to irregular appointment procedures.

In August 2008, the Alake of Egbaland, Adedotun Gbadebo, had to beg for forgiveness when the then state government, led by Gbenga Daniel, threatened to dethrone him based on his public lament on the bad condition of roads in Abeokuta.

I was one of the journalists who interviewed Iba Gani Adams, the 15th Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland, in 2017 when he was announced as the Aare. As a highly revered generalissimo who led many battles with the Oodua Peoples Congress as its national coordinator, we asked if he would use his position as Aare Ona Kakanfo to lead the Yoruba to war. His response: “The position in the past meant that you had to continually fight wars to protect your people and may be killed in the process, but that was before Nigeria became a sovereign nation. The job in the modern era is limited in terms of physical defence because there are security apparatuses to settle disputes.”

The new Alalafin, Oba Owoade, should know that he is occupying a privileged position, ordained by God with the support of Governor Makinde. Prince Gbadegesin could have been on the throne today if the kingmakers had their way. As a royal father of repute, Oba Owoade must use his position to promote peace, not just among fellow Obas but among the entire Yoruba race. As one of the fathers of the Yoruba race, he must use his native wisdom and intelligence to proffer solutions and advise the government on how to deal with some of the intractable problems in the South-West region.

Having squabbles with a fellow monarch over a territory in faraway United States, less than a month after you are crowned is not ideal. The Oba will also do well to know his limits as a modern-day Oba and not view himself as an emperor in times past. He may incur the wrath of the state government if he does that. The same white whiteman who made the pencil also made the eraser to strike out whatsoever was written by the pencil.

Lastly, I must commend the Ooni of Ife for the equanimity with which he has borne some of the unprovoked attacks against him. If the Ooni had responded in like manner to some of the statements and actions made against it, it may have degenerated into a major conflict, as the media and bloggers will feast on it and blow it out of proportion.

No matter his deified or apotheosis status, the Ooni is still a human and is bound to make mistakes. When such happens, we must respect his sacred office and crown (Tadenikawo). For those accusing the Ooni of making himself too accessible by attending all manners of events, that is an infantile way of reasoning. In fact, the Ooni should attend more events where he can showcase the rich Yoruba and African culture which he embodies to the public. The Ooni of today is not a statue that will sit in his palace, expecting people to come and pay homage to him. The fact that he makes himself accessible is not a licence for anyone to ridicule his personality or his crown. As the saying goes, ‘The gentility of a lion is not a sign of cowardice.’ Those who desecrated or attempted to ridicule the crown of the Ooni, unprovoked, all paid for it. If in doubt, ask the Oba of Lagos, Naomi Silekunola; Sunday Igboho; Dr. Rahmon Adedoyin, self-acclaimed investigative journalist; Bristol Issac Tamunobifiri @PidomNigeria and others.

I enjoin the new Alaafin, Oba Owoade, the Ooni of Ife, the Oluwo of Iwo and other royal fathers to bury their hatchets, join hands together and pray for the peace, progress and stability of the Yoruba race rather than continue the age-long tradition of superiority battles. Like Wale Ojo-Lanre said “What the time demands is not a return to the fragmented glory of ancient pride but a renewal of Yoruba unity. If the Alaafin represents the strength of Oyo and the Ooni symbolises the spiritual bedrock of Ife, then together, they must weave the fabric of Yoruba resurgence. Ego and envy cannot build a future. Respect and cooperation can”.

Akinsuyi, former group politics editor of Daily Independent, studies sustainability communications strategies at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

In the aftermath of Pope Francis’ death, many Africans on the continent and in the diaspora wondered if the Catholic Church would, for a change, elect a Black Pope. Well, they got one in Pope Leo XIV even if this isn’t apparent on the surface.

Although the Pope doesn’t identify as Black, he has Black African bloodline flowing in his veins through his mother.

Robert Francis Prevost, who changed his name to Leo XIV upon becoming the pope, traces maternal ancestral roots to grandparents in the state of Louisiana whose ancestry is part Black African.

According to the New York Times, “The pope’s maternal grandparents, both of whom are described as Black or mulatto in various historical records,” lived in a part of New Orleans, Louisiana’s biggest city, “that is traditionally Catholic and a melting pot of people with African, Caribbean and European roots.”

Records from the 1900 census, the New York Times reports, show that the man who gave birth to the pope’s mother, identified as Joseph Martinez, described his race as “Black” and his birthplace as “Hayti,” the older English spelling for Haiti.

Haitians trace ancestral descent from six major West African ethnic groups: Fon and Ewe from what is now Benin Republic and Togo; Yoruba from what is now Nigeria and Benin Republic; Igbo and Kongo from what is now Nigeria and Central Africa respectively; and Akan from present-day Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire.

That means there is a high likelihood that the pope has distant cousins from Nigeria. That won’t be surprising because, as I pointed out in my February 13, 2021, column titled “Surprising American Cousins Through My Mother’s Ancestry,” my own AncestryDNA record, which I initiated with my mother when she visited me from Nigeria between 2017 and 2018, matched us with several phenotypically white distant American cousins.

“As we went through the photos of hundreds of distant cousins that AncestryDNA’s matches showed, [my mother] was struck with astonishment to find lily white people as her eight cousins,” I wrote. “She asked how that was possible. I explained to her that in the American South, where most Black people were enslaved, many slavers sexually exploited the enslaved, the consequence of which DNA results are now revealing.”

The new pope’s story is another possible explanation.

It should be noted that the pope’s maternal grandfather obviously also had European, possibly French and Spanish, ancestry in addition to his African ancestry. He was probably so light-skinned that he could pass for a white man outside the United States.

He probably chose to identify as Black only because of America’s strange “one-drop rule,” which held that a person with even the faintest scintilla of Black African blood in his/her pedigree is Black.

As Madison Grant wrote in his unbearably racist book titled The Passing of the Great Race, “The cross between a white man and an Indian is an Indian; the cross between a white man and a negro is a negro; the cross between a white man and a Hindu is a Hindu; and the cross between any of the three European races and a Jew is a Jew.”

In other words, whiteness symbolizes purity, and any other color line that touches it inevitably soils it. So, the American notion of Blackness conceives of it as an inerasable genetic stain on whiteness, so that the remotest ancestral connection with Black Africa defines one as Black.

That is why the legendary three-time heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali whose great-grandfather was an Irishman is celebrated as a Black American. That’s why former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is probably just about 15 percent Black in his gene pool, is celebrated as a Black American success story.

It is why Mariah Carey, who would be called “bature” or “oyinbo” in Nigeria, or “muzungu” in eastern Africa, is accepted by Black America as a Black woman. And that is why it is only in America that a white woman can have Black children, but a Black woman cannot have white children.

This preposterous logic, this scandalously hidebound, hopelessly essentialist notion of Blackness would make most Europeans “Black” since recent DNA evidence suggests that about 75 percent of Western and Southern Europeans have vestiges of African blood in them.

In the eighteenth century, a German physician and anthropologist by the name of Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, on the basis of his flawed analysis of human skulls, taxonomized the human family into five races: Caucasian or white race, Mongolian or yellow race, Malayan or brown race, Negroid or black race, and American or red race.

This arbitrary division of the human family is often fingered as the foundation for scientific racism. It was used by eighteenth-century American judges as the intellectual and moral basis for the promulgation of so-called anti-miscegenation laws (laws that forbade interracial marriage or interracial sex) in a misguided bid to police racial boundaries.

One of the reasons interracial marriages were frowned upon by advocates of racial purism was that mixed-raced children disrupted the easy certainties of Blumenbach’s simplistic racial taxonomy.

As Yale University professor of history Glenda Gilmore once noted, interracial liaisons “resulted in mixed race progeny who slipped back and forth across the color line and defied social control.”

The pope’s maternal grandmother was Creole, who are descendants of the racial alchemy between French, Spanish, and African ancestors but who are nonetheless categorized as “Black” in the United State because of the (il)logic of the one-drop rule. Famous American musicians with Louisiana Creole heritage are Beyonce (through her mother) and Prince.

Creoles can be so light-skinned that they can pass for white. Throughout the nearly two years I lived in Louisiana, I often had difficulty telling a white person from a Black person. People I considered unambiguously white took offense when I identified them as such; they would tell me they were “Black.”

On other occasions, however, people I thought would self-identify as “Black” based on my previous encounters with seemingly white “Creoles” would take offense when I called them Black. Before I left Louisiana, I stopped guessing or discussing people’s racial identity. Yes, racial identification is that tenuous, that fluid, and that notoriously unstable in southwest Louisiana!

It was unsurprising that the pope’s mother, Mildred Martinez, identified as white. With a light-skinned Black Haitian father and a probably even more light-skinned Creole mother from New Orleans, she most certainly would look phenotypically white.

She chose to escape the chains that Blackness imposed on her and embraced whiteness. In America’s racial terminology, she would be described as having performed “passing.”

Passing is defined as a phenomenon when a phenotypically white but legally Black person (because of traces of African ancestry in them) intentionally present themselves as white to evade racial discrimination and gain access to social, economic, or legal advantages in a racially stratified society where white people occupy the upper end of the totem pole.

During the Jim Crow era in southern United States, when segregation and anti-Black laws were codified in the law books, “passing” was often a survival strategy for light-skinned Black people who could physically blend into white society. I have no doubt that that was what happened with the pope’s mother.

John Joseph Prevost, the pope’s brother, told the New York Times that they don’t discuss their mother’s Black heritage. “It was never an issue,” he said. In fact, USA Today and many American newspapers describe the pope’s mother’s heritage as “Spanish.” The African part of her rich racial tapestry is elided.

The New York Times reported on the pope’s maternal African heritage only because a Black New Orleans genealogist by the name of Jari C. Honora unearthed it with powerfully compelling documentary evidence and shared it with the paper.

Well, going by America’s peculiar logic of racial classification, the pope is “Black” because his whiteness is mediated by the invisible, imperceptible, maybe even genetically negligible, but nonetheless undeniable Black African blood coursing through his papal veins.

I just read that Professor Abayomi Sunday Fasina, Vice-Chancellor of the Federal University Oye-Ekiti (FUOYE), has filed a lawsuit against SaharaReporters and the Foundation for Investigative Journalism (FIJ) for publishing audio recordings of him persistently sexually harassing a married senior non-academic staff member of the university identified as Mrs. Folasade Adebayo.

Curiously, the lawsuit isn't denying the authenticity of the disturbing audio records of Fasina’s tediously importunate demands for sexual favors from this married woman. 

Instead, Fasina is just distressed that the audio records were published without the courtesy of his professorial (or is it vice-chancellorial) consent. 

This, his lawyers said, has injured his well-earned "standing as an academic, public servant, and Christian leader." Nothing says "Christian leader" quite like obstinately demanding sexual favors from someone else's spouse, you know!

Fasina’s lawyers said publishing these unimpeachably factual audio records of his sexual harassment without his consent amounted to "cyberbullying, cyber stalking and blackmail." Ha! Did these lawyers attend a legal academy that specializes in comedy routines?

 Note that things got to this stage because Mrs. Adebayo suffered retaliation from Professor Fasina because she froze off his sexual advances. She fought back by filing a complaint against him, mistakenly assuming that reporting sexual harassment would result in accountability.

 But the university's governing council predictably exonerated Fasina of all charges in spite of irrefutably overwhelming evidence of clear sexual harassment by Fasina.

 In fact, in a bizarre twist, Fasina turned around and accused Mrs. Adebayo of attempting to seduce him! 

That must have been what led the woman to share the audio files of Fasina's compromising audio chats with her with the media. (For the record, there is no evidence that SaharaReporters and FIJ got the audio tapes from her. This is just my hunch.) 

Now, Fasina is saying because an obviously compromised internal investigation exonerated him, the media should not have touched the issue again, even if there's contrary evidence to impeach the credibility of the outcome of the investigation. 

In other words, once a “paddy-paddy” university panel declares someone innocent, reality itself should unquestioningly bow to that ruling, and media organizations must unthinkingly bury any contrary evidence deep in inquisitorial oblivion.

Fortunately, that is not the way the law works. In libel law, truth is always a defense. Defamation can't be said to have occurred if your reputation suffers irreparable injury on the basis of factual, provable, empirically sound allegations. 

Let’s see how Fasina’s SLAPP (i.e. Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) against SaharaReporters and FIJ plays out in court.