Nobel laureate Professor Wole Soyinka has issued a sharp public criticism over what he describes as the excessive use of security personnel guarding the family of President Bola Tinubu.
Speaking at the 20th Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism Awards in Lagos, the renowned playwright and activist warned that such deployments dangerously distort the nation’s security priorities and represent a profound misuse of state resources.
Soyinka recounted a recent personal experience that prompted his remarks. He explained that upon leaving his hotel in the Ikoyi area of Lagos, he encountered a scene so large and heavily armed that he initially assumed a movie was being filmed on the premises.
He described seeing what looked like nearly a full battalion occupying the hotel grounds, with personnel heavily armed to the teeth.
The professor noted that a young man politely detached himself from the group to greet him. Only after returning to his car did Soyinka learn from his driver that the young man was Seyi Tinubu, the president’s son.
Soyinka expressed disbelief at the scale of the security detail, stating that the contingent of about fifteen heavily armed officers looked sufficient to take over a neighbouring small country or city like the Republic of Benin.
Profoundly disturbed by the sight, Soyinka said he immediately attempted to contact the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu, to verify if the deployment was official. He was able to reach the NSA, who was in Paris at the time for a meeting with the president.
Soyinka said he described the scene and pointedly asked, “Do you mean a child of the head of state goes around with an army for his protection?” He stated that he could not believe such an arrangement was sanctioned.
Using characteristically sarcastic wit to underscore his point, Soyinka suggested that the federal government might not need to deploy the military or air force to address threats in neighbouring countries. He quipped that the president has an easier option, saying, “Next time there’s an uprising, the president should call that young man and say, ‘Seyi, go and put down those stupid people there. You have troops under your command.'”
Soyinka concluded with a serious admonition about the proper place of family members of leaders within a nation’s security architecture. He stressed that while heads of state have families, such privilege must never be abused. “Children should know their place. They are not potentates; they are not heads of state,” he asserted.
The playwright warned that the security of the nation suffers when there is such a heavy devotion of resources to protecting one young individual, implying it comes at the expense of broader national security needs.
