“Nigeria cannot develop because we generally tolerate dishonesty – as long as it is perpetrated by those we like and whose lack of integrity favours us.” — Dele Sobowale, ‘The End of Nigerian Political Parties’ (10.8.2025)
Dear Columnist Dele Sobowale,
I was expecting your usual annual ritual of penning the celebratory birthday essay for Ibrahim Babangida — the Prodigal Son-in-Chief of Nigeria. This is why I saved the quote above from your essay of last week. It is mainly to remind you that as fallible human beings and due to the psychological phenomenon called confirmation bias, mankind tends to see only what each desires to see.
Even then, it is remarkable that a senior Columnist like you with many years of meritorious service to the country is still refusing to acknowledge that the deplorable and woeful state of the general human existence in Nigeria today is largely due to the consequences of the ruinous seeds of political, economic and spiritual corruptions that Ibrahim Babangida generously sowed in the length and breadth of the country.
Every truthful student of contemporary political history of Nigeria knows that Ibrahim Babangida is the arrowhead that laid the abnormal foundation stones of the mega-corruption that is ravaging and bedevilling government institutions in Nigeria. He is the man who upended the ethical and moral values of the nations, as he encouraged and promoted the bastardisation of all the hitherto known noble social and spiritual virtues that were held sacrosanct by every nation presently occupying the amalgamated geographical space called Nigeria. (Nigeria’s Darkest Moment, 1985-98 (IV) – The Cult of Ibrahim Babangida)
Every keen observer of Nigeria can’t fail to wonder, how you, a moral sensible person, can easily discount and sweep under the carpet all the nefarious, soul-chilling and life-poisoning activities that IBB championed and orchestrated between 1985 and 1993 in his demonic scheme to become a Life President of Nigeria.
The summary of what Ibrahim Babangida wrote down in his autobiography suggests that the military regime he led actually messed up the country, big time. In the Babangida’s prideful style of behaviour, this memoir which is a self confession of some of his evil deeds, should have been used as an opportunity to offer unreserved apologies to the people. But Babangida failed miserably to say the healing words that should normally come from a contrite heart to the nation. He could not bring himself to humbly write or say it openly to the people he wronged terribly that “I am sincerely sorry. Please forgive me”. When all is said and done, the memoir showed that Babangida is not a hero that any sane person should worship. He is a villain and a charlatan who foolishly gave his soul to the devil for money, power and ephemeral glory. He will forever remain the man who led the people of Nigeria astray into the pit of hell.
It is unfortunate to note that your main remark on the Babangida’s Memoir was that if he had consulted you, as an expert in marketing, you would have advised him to hide his faults and failings far back in the book.
“As a professional Marketing/Sales professional, … If you have a less than perfect product to sell, you don’t start by highlighting its defects. You present the good story first. If I was consulted, I would have advised that the first two or three chapters be devoted to the positive achievements already documented before mentioning and explaining the undesirable aspects and would not dwell long on it.” — Dele Sobowale
Obviously, you are more concerned about propaganda and image laundering that will hide the truth rather than encourage repentance, forgiveness and reconciliation. Hence, you are more comfortable to pander and to present elaborate but illogical excuses for the failures of a man who gladly rejoices when called a ‘maradona’ — political dribbler of the nation, or an ‘evil genius’ for his Machiavellian approach to statecraft.
I think most people who enjoy reading your weekly essays for its useful socioeconomic and political diary on Nigeria, can’t helped but to wonder what was the price that IBB paid directly or indirectly to purchase your unyielding loyalty and everlasting faithfulness. Some of us know that IBB is generous to a fault, particularly with the state treasury of Nigeria. And that his generosity was always strategic and purposeful. For IBB’s generous offerings were never far from being used as a weapon to blackmail anyone who he discovered could be useful to his selfish political interests.
Some of us got drawn to your erudite scholarship in the way you present national issues in your weekly discourses. You’ve always brought clarity and meaning to the why and how the depressing state of the current affairs of Nigeria have come to be as it is. Your well-written weekly essays have always captured the general imagination of what many thinking Nigerians agree to be true and candid about the ongoing socioeconomic and political shenanigans in Nigeria.
However, your yearly obsession that tries to rebrand, sanitise and promote the convoluted legacy of IBB gives me a real concern. And your refusal to see and acknowledge what your fellow writers, associates and readers of your column are saying about the true legacy of Ibrahim Babangida, is worrisome. It is obvious that you have completely misinterpreted your often cited lists of the so-called laudable achievements of your Hero, ‘President’ Ibrahim Babangida — The Hopelessly Lost Man With The Feet Of Clay.
Methinks, the question which you have failed to impartially consider and address, is the worth or worthlessness of Ibrahim Babangida to the development or underdevelopment of Nigeria. Simply put: Are the lives of Nigerians better or worse, more developed or more underdeveloped, more progressive or more regressive because of your often-listed Ibrahim Babangida’s so-called remarkable contributions to Nigeria? If your answer still remain a Yes, then one would humbly suggest that your interpretative and analytical spectacles are long overdue for a spiritual adjustment or replacement.
Again, one is tempted to ponder on the idiom that says ‘birds of the same feather flock together’. If the adage is true, could it be that your thinking, perception and the worldview of life are much more closely aligned with those of IBB? If it is so, should Nigerians that read your weekly essays and who rely on your expert judgments continue to trust the sincerity of your weekly socioeconomic and political analysis? Does it mean that all the tears you are shedding for Nigeria in your essays every week, are mere ‘crocodile tears’?
This is because, if an acclaimed professional healer of either the body or mind or soul gets the diagnosis of the problems afflicting the sick person under his care wrong, the suggested therapeutic method or the prescribed drugs to cure the ailment would most likely send the patient to the grave rather than provide the healing and succour that are urgently needed.
Today, Nigeria and Nigerians are critically ill and both are lying powerless and hopeless in the intensive care unit of the world sanatorium. Hence, it becomes a serious concern when a celebrated writer of your calibre is not being fully truthful or not convincingly clear-headed, as one would expect, about the fundamental causes of the problems that have made Nigeria very sick and have left the mass of the population in a comatose state. This is why Nigerians are being forced to ask the most salient question, If notable writers and thinkers are misleading the people and cannot fathom a better way out of the national crisis, where else should Nigerians look for answers and permanent solutions to the serious existential crisis that are begging for urgent attention?
I think this is the dilemma facing some of your readers and admirers whenever you put pen to paper in your attempt to refurbish the self-inflicted and the irreparably damaged image of Ibrahim Babangida. It feels as if you are deriving some joy and pleasure at pricking the yet-to-be-healed open sores of pain and suffering that Ibrahim Babangida wilfully inflicted on the lives of fellow Nigerians.
This is the impression that one gets when it is discovered that the highlight of your professional endeavours in the month of August is the writing of a celebratory essay for Ibrahim Babangida’s birthday. And one feels that you don’t seem to care a hoot, if this embarrassing engagement insults the intelligence and the sensibilities of other fellow reading and thinking Nigerians.
I and other fellow awakened Nigerians will continue to wish you well. And if you insist that until death comes your way, your unwarranted positive attitude on an unrepentant evil man like IBB will forever remain constant and immovable like the Northern Star, the loss is yours only.
All your well wishers and admirers will surely wonder why you decided to sacrifice or taint your impeccable legacy as a brilliant columnist and a fearless objective writer to the altar of IBB in your old age. We can only advise you not to throw away your own legacy and immense contributions to Nigeria’s moral development for the sake of the Evil Genius. A man who, because of a selfish and vainglorious political ambition that single-handedly succeeded in bringing down a country to its abject prostrate knees, does not worth such a mighty sacrifice from you.
Finally, and quoting from your own statement, you need to be reminded that “Nigeria cannot develop because we generally tolerate dishonesty – as long as it is perpetrated by those we like and whose lack of integrity favours us.” — Dele Sobowale.
In The Spirit of Truth
SAM ABBD ISRAEL
Links
https://www.vanguardngr.com/2025/08/birthday-greetings-to-ibb-at-84-by-dele-sobowale/
https://www.vanguardngr.com/2025/08/the-end-of-nigerian-political-parties-by-dele-sobowale/
https://samabbdisrael.com/2017/01/12/nigeria-on-fire-nigerias-darkest-moment-1985-98-iv/
ITSOT 