Last week, Bloomberg, owned by American politician, Democrat and three-term Mayor of New York City, Michael Rubens Bloomberg, jabbed Nigeria’s president-elect, Bola Tinubu, with a tainted house purchase in London by about-to-be first son, Seyi Tinubu. The report reverberated across the world mainly because it was the first time a foreign news platform, from the stable of a powerful American politician, would roar in, with a bullish exposé on the incoming Nigeria’s First Family, despite the lame attempt at suggesting the president-elect was not being tied to the sleaze-ridden deal that appeared more like a buy-out or buy-back.
Of course, the entire orbit of the deal has too many ethic questions around it, but more worrisome is the diplomatic and security dimensions that could substantially hurt Nigeria under Tinubu, and the unfortunate give-away his administration may have to do, to make the rest of the family baggage go away, at least, for now.
No doubt, Tinubu’s business empire and influence (only children of his kind could get to buy a London property already seized by the Nigerian government) that gave his family humongous wealth has warts crawling all over it, but it is an undesirable spot he would be sharing with America’s globalist president, Joe Biden, whose family too, especially his first son, Hunter, are deep in alleged shady dealings around the world, including in China, America’s biggest foe.
Incidentally, just like Tinubu and Nigeria’s local media, America’s mainstream media, has done everything illicit in journalism to blot out Biden’s family alleged scandals, though conservatives in Congress and a sprinkle of news platforms like Fox, New York Post et al, keep circling around the first family’s hidden deals like vultures. Days back, the GOP in Congress hinted there was a smoking gun to tie Joe to Hunter’s dirty deeds. A letter has been fired to the FBI for documents that may trigger Joe’s probe and possible impeachment. Such news never excites the major media over there, once the presidential scandal isn’t Donald Trump’s.
Until Bloomberg ran the Seyi Tinubu story, the Western media had been largely silent on the president-elect’s past beyond allusions that are neither here nor there. Yoruba will call such posturing ‘ofege’. And it wasn’t because the materials weren’t there. The paper trail, which birthed the Bloomberg scoop, had always been there. Among other information about the Lagos ex-governor, the questionable deal would have long been passed around as storable intelligence among the Western powers, considering he has remained a powerhouse in politics, even before his run. The question is: why not all this time? Why now?
Politics and media in the Western world are now permanently in unholy matrimony. Even in developing world, politicians and journalists are yoked, but it is more of an institutional thing in the West, while bread and butter rules the union in places like Nigeria, where personal survival has put the media at the beck and call of politicians. Over there, it is a pride thing to make governments and bring governments down, even when some falsifications, go in as dessert. In April, when U.S Air Force National Guard airman, Jack Douglas Teixeira leaked US intelligence about their foreign policies, it turned out most of the reports published by American media, on the Russian/Ukraine war, weren’t accurate. But who cares.
The report on Seyi Tinubu isn’t inaccurate and even his father’s rapid-response media war room has been mute since the story went viral. The only noticeable move was getting lawyers to extricate the president-elect in public opinion court and extrapolate on how the alleged corrupt act can’t affect his swearing-in.
Yes, Tinubu will come into a spread-sheet immunity once inaugurated as president and practically all the alleged cases against him would stall under the weight of Section 308, but what Washington and its allies will likely seek to continue looking the other way, may easily trump presidential immunity.
The Bloomberg exclusive is a warning shot and it is possibly that mild, because Tinubu has always identified as a Democrat and a major supporter, though the news that he hired personal Russian bodyguards might have jolted Washington, considering the ongoing war between America and Russia, being prosecuted on the turf of Ukraine. America is always seeking leaderships that it can easily manipulate. It makes diplomacy of quid pro quo easy for Washington and its knitted allies like Britain. When a leader is docile or his dossier isn’t too pretty, America’s foreign policy with such a nation is made because when Washington speaks, it wants every piece of humanity to comply.
Right now in Africa, South Africa and Egypt are leading the Resistance Movement that the continent has always needed to end the boi-boi (slavish) relational with the West. Nigeria, as Africa’s giant, should ordinarily lead, but….
No doubt, as president, Tinubu will not be laid-back, like the outgoing. Even with his growing age and struggling health, he has tried to remain his colourful old self in carriage and even, in speech delivery. He was a razzle-dazzle politician before the obvious, but undisclosed ailment, robbed him of his swashbuckle. He is the type of president that would want to sound like the South African leader who pointedly told U.S that instead of being compelled under some shady Charter that binds member-states to the International Criminal Court to arrest President Putin during a state visit, his country would rather withdraw from ICC. That is exactly how to treat America and its exploitative diplomatic engagements.
But our incoming president is already a hat trick down to the Western powers. America will hunt him with his business past, corralling others into whatever agenda the Biden administration may have stored for his presidency.
As brash as Trump was as president, America didn’t fight a single war during his four-year reign. Apart from engaging Russia in Ukraine, America is very close to another proxy war with China, using Taiwan, just under three years of Biden.
Understandably, it is easier for an average non-American to connect with the Democrats because of their framed inclusivity, diversity and free-world rhetoric, where everybody is everybody’s brother’s keeper. But globalism as packaged by American progressives/liberals is end-time satanic agenda to advance the dark kingdom.
Very soon, legalisation of LGBTQ+, kid gender transitioning would parental consent, abortion, weeds, drugs, et al, and other “my body, my choice” nonsense, that today, drive the campaign and winning votes of the Biden administration, would soon be presented to the Tinubu administration for consideration, alongside other economic interests. It is not a culture war, it is Light Vs darkness, QED.
Since the push began during Jonathan era, the only reason White House under Obama and Biden had not succeeded so far, was because Nigeria had not elected a businessman-President. Now, one is coming and his hands may be tied.
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