At last, Nigeria has found the latest culprit behind its endless insecurity: not Boko Haram, not ISWAP, not bandits roaming the highways as if they are concessions given to them by the Federal Government, not decades of bad governance, underfunded security forces, and certainly not corruption that eats defence budgets faster than termites eat wood. No-the new grand villain is Donald J. Trump.
Yes, according to Secretary to the Government of the Federation George Akume, the sudden spate of terror attacks is the fault of a man sitting in Washington, firing off sound bites like he’s still hosting reality TV.
Apparently, Trump’s “recent pronouncements” magically emboldened terrorists who were otherwise on the brink of retirement – perhaps preparing to apply for pension in Sambisa Forest.
It is the sort of explanation you offer when you have run out of actual explanations.
In a dramatic Wednesday statement that could win an award for creative political storytelling, Mr Akume insisted that insurgency structures had been “significantly degraded” before Trump opened his mouth.
One might almost imagine Boko Haram commanders glued to Fox News, waiting for the orange oracle in the White House to mention Nigeria so they could resume killing innocent citizens.
And of course, Trump did not disappoint. In October, he designated Nigeria a “country of particular concern” over allegations of Christian genocide a label American evangelicals treat as prophecy and Nigerian politicians treat as slander.
Trump even threatened to deploy American troops if the killings persisted, because nothing solves African conflict like a little foreign invasion cosplay.
But Mr Akume wants Nigerians to believe these remarks caused more damage to national security than the actual terrorists who kidnapped schoolgirls from Chibok and Kebbi, leaving families to age with grief while the state recited the same tired promises like broken poetry.
He wants us to forget that bandits roam highways uninterrupted, that villagers flee their homes nonstop, and that whole communities have normalised sleeping with one eye open. No blame Trump. It’s neater.
The statement sounded less like a government briefing from the SGF and more like an attempt at political exorcism, as if reciting “foreign interference” could exorcise the demons of insecurity tormenting the people of Nigeria.
He was saying, in essence, that the now-weakened insurgency networks had managed to “leverage” Trump’s words to regain visibility.
Of course, terror groups, notorious for bombings and mass kidnappings, do need motivational speeches from American presidents to remember what they’re trying to accomplish.
It’s a bizarre fantasy in which Trump plays spiritual godfather to African terrorists one only the Nigerian government could market with a straight face.
The same statement reassured Nigerians that the country does not need foreign troops. Comforting words, albeit a tad ironic coming from an administration that has begged every foreign partner-from the United States to Turkey-for hardware, drones, ammunition, and intelligence.
Nigeria does not want troops, Mr Akume insists, only “targeted support.” It is like saying you do not need a loan, only the money inside the loan.
He repeated that the Nigerian Armed Forces are “professional,” “highly capable,” and that they have “reclaimed vast territories.”
The kind of recitation that sounds encouraging until you compare it to the lived reality: communities still displaced, villages still unsafe, bandits still dictating curfews in areas where the constitution supposedly reigns.
And, in a not-so-surprising swipe at Trump, Mr Akume denied that Nigeria was witnessing a Christian genocide.
According to him, insurgents kill both Muslims and Christians a fact painfully well-known to Nigerians.
But what is known to them far too painfully is that this government finds its voice only when foreigners say the same thing its citizens have been screaming for years.
Whether reckless or politically motivated, Trump’s comments did not invent Nigeria’s insecurity. They did not snatch schoolchildren from Chibok in 2014.
They did not abduct the innocent girls from Kebbi. They did not occupy villages in Borno or massacre commuters on Kaduna-Abuja highways.
They did not turn farming into a deadly gamble or convert the North-West into an open-air war zone.
Insecurity in Nigeria is a homegrown tragedy watered for years by incompetence and fertilised by denial.
Accountability is an ugly word in the theatre of Nigerian politics.
So, rather than confront the hydra-headed failures staring the country in the face, the government has found comfort in international scapegoating.
Today, it is Trump. Tomorrow, perhaps China. Next week, maybe Canada. Anyone but those actually in charge of the country.
Of course, Trump’s rhetoric-dramatic, sensational, and often divorced from context-is not innocuous.
Labeling Nigeria a “country of particular concern” is a diplomatic grenade. It feeds global narratives that simplify complex conflicts into neat religious binaries.
It invites foreign pressures and stokes domestic religious tensions. But to claim that his comments triggered new attacks is to stretch the truth till it screams.
Terror organisations respond to opportunity, not press statements. They thrive on state weakness, not White House briefings. And Nigeria’s weakness did not begin in October.
Yet, the Tinubu administration wants Nigerians to be made to believe that, before Trump appeared, all was almost well. Bandits were apparently packing their things.
ISWAP was allegedly writing farewell notes. Boko Haram was contemplating entrepreneurship.
Until Trump spoke and suddenly the terrorists remembered their rifles.
It’s a political fairy tale that collapses under the weight of its own absurdity.
What Nigeria’s insecurity needs is honesty: the brutal type.
The type that says our security architecture is overstretched, under-equipped, and mostly compromised;
the type that says communities have largely become self-defence units because they no longer trust in the state’s capacity to protect them;
the type that recognises that high-profile abductions like Chibok and Kebbi are not isolated tragedies but symbols of systemic rot.
Honesty is rare in governance. Sarcasm, on the other hand, is in plentiful supply, especially when leaders blame American soundbites for blood on Nigerian soil.
Mr Akume concluded his statement by reminding the world that Nigeria is a secular state.
A noble reminder, but one that does not stop bullets, does not rescue abducted girls, and does not return the thousands who have died because the state failed them.
Secular or not, Nigerians deserve security that works, not security that is explained away using foreign scapegoats.
So, here we are again: a bleeding nation, a lecturing government, and a faraway White House being named the new mastermind of Nigeria’s sorrow. If only terrorists could be defeated with press releases, Nigeria would be the safest place on earth.
But reality is not that generous.
And until the leadership ceases to outsource blame and begins to squarely face insecurity with transparency, urgency, and competence, Nigerians will be stuck in a tragic loop when politicians issue statements blaming everybody but themselves.
