By Okoi Obono-Obla
The Nigerian opposition has descended into a theatre of noise — petty, disorderly, and utterly rudderless. Rather than confronting the nation’s pressing challenges with ideas, it clings to diversions and frivolities, mistaking volume for substance.
Take the recent attempt to politicize flooding in Abuja. Flooding is a natural phenomenon, worsened globally by climate change, and disasters of this kind are occurring everywhere. Yet the opposition chose to mock the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, instead of acknowledging the principle of force majeure — acts of God beyond human control.
This pattern of irrelevance is not new. Like a football crowd in South Africa drumming up exhausted players, the opposition thrives on distraction, not direction. A presidential candidate even resurrected an event from over a decade ago — the choice of a running mate to President Muhammadu Buhari (may he rest in peace) — as though it were a defining issue in today’s campaign. Meanwhile, Nigerians continue to grapple with inflation, insecurity, and economic uncertainty, yet the opposition offers no practical agenda, only noise.
The start of the 2027 general election campaign on 19 August 2027 should have been an opportunity for sober reflection. After all, the opposition had just been humiliated in the Osun State gubernatorial election, where a combined front managed fewer than 20,000 votes. Instead of facing this reality, it boasted of a fictitious pact with Senator Nurudeen Adeleke’s Accord Party — a claim Adeleke himself unequivocally denied.
Rather than regrouping, the opposition doubled down on irrelevance: mocking natural disasters, dragging the First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, into the fray, and clinging to distractions that do nothing to advance Nigeria’s future.
Conclusion
The opposition’s fixation on trivialities is not merely embarrassing; it is dangerous. A democracy thrives on constructive debate, but what we see today is a hollow chorus of diversions. Nigerians deserve leaders who will speak to the economy, security, and governance — not a carnival of irrelevance. Until the opposition abandons its politics of frivolity, it will remain a crowd without vision, drumming noise while the nation demands solutions.
