By H. Y. Poloma
There are moments in the life of a nation when the mask of statecraft slips so violently that the naked, hideous and terrifying reality of power is exposed for all to see. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s recent public proclamation that “in politics, all is fair” is precisely such a moment.
Uttered with the callous defiance of a warlord surveying his conquered territory, this obscene declaration is not merely a philosophical gaffe. It is the chilling, unvarnished confession of state capture. It is an explicit rejection of constitutional limits, moral boundaries, and the social contract.
Coming from a sitting president eyeing the 2027 ballot, it is a direct threat to the lives, liberties and sovereignty of over 200 million Nigerians.
To declare that “all is fair” in the governance and politics of a nation buckling under the weight of state-induced poverty, pervasive insecurity, and institutional decay is to operationalize lawlessness. It is an open licence for political brigandage. It tells us that, under this administration, ethics are for the weak, laws are irrelevant, and the apparatus of the state is a personal weapon to be wielded in a ruthless, egregious battle of regime survival against the Nigerian people.
For decades, shameless sycophants have repeatedly marketed Tinubu as a master strategist, a democrat and a progressive. But true political strategy operates within the bounds of civic legitimacy and public good. What Tinubu proclaimed in his “all is fair” mantra is not strategy; it is heartless Machiavellian thuggery elevated as state policy.
When a president adopts the mantra that all is fair, he has eroded the vital distinction between a democratic head of state and a ruthless autocrat. In a true democracy, rules matter. Processes matter. Transparency matters. Fairness is the very oxygen that keeps the democratic enterprise alive.
By declaring his war on the concept of fairness, Tinubu revealed a profound contempt for the citizens he once swore to protect. He is telling a battered populace that truth, justice, and accountability are now casualties for his political convenience.
This is the heretical creed of a desperate and wicked politician who views power as his private property to be acquired and retained by any means necessary and, by extension, any means unlawful.
But why did Tinubu utter such a dangerous doctrine at this very point in time? What frightening threat is he now sending to Nigerians? The answer lies in the panicked corridors of Aso Rock. Tinubu’s obsession with securing a second term in 2027 has metastasized into a paranoid crusade of desperation. Just look at the objective realities and dismal legacies of his administration: an economy battered by chaotic, unfeeling policies that have driven inflation to agonizing heights and turned basic survival into existential misery; a landscape where rivers of blood flow freely from the North to the South while terrorists and kidnappers operate with impunity.
A leader who has delivered such unprecedented misery cannot run on a record of achievement. He cannot campaign on hope. Therefore, he must campaign on, and resort to, subjugation.
His “all is fair” doctrine is the foundational justification for the ruthless subversion of 2027. It is the ideological armour for an impending electoral heist. It signals to electoral umpires, security agencies, and party thugs that institutional independence is now a myth and that the full might of state coercion and brutality will be deployed to crush dissent and opposition.
When a president views politics as a total war where everything is permitted, state resources cease to belong to the public; they become his personal war chest for self-preservation. Security forces stop protecting citizens and start shielding the regime from its own failures.
Nigeria is now sleepwalking into a terminal crisis under the governance of a man who believes that power supersedes morality. History teaches what happens when rulers adopt the “all is fair” philosophy: institutions rot, corruption becomes statecraft, elections become farcical rituals, and the citizenry is reduced to a subjugated colony.
Tinubu’s chilling pronouncement must be met with fierce, unyielding resistance from every corner of our republic. It must be recognized for what it is: the desperate death rattle of a regime that knows it has lost the mandate of the people and therefore intends at all costs to steal tomorrow because it cannot defend today.
If all is fair in Tinubu’s politics, then resistance by a fed-up, impoverished, and cornered citizenry is not just fair; it is an existential duty.
Nigeria belongs to Nigerians, not to a cabal of political desperados who view the nation as a chessboard and its people as pawns and collateral damage.
Tinubu’s mask is now off and Nigerians must become ever more vigilant. The warning has been issued. The response must be total.
✍️ H. Y. Poloma
