Now isn’t the time to immortalise Tinubu

Within eleven months, a dozen structures including institutions were named after Nigeria’s serving president, Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The most recent of the naming obsession took place on January 23, 2025 when the president commissioned the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Barracks – named after him in Abuja. Before this, the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, in […]

Within eleven months, a dozen structures including institutions were named after Nigeria’s serving president, Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The most recent of the naming obsession took place on January 23, 2025 when the president commissioned the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Barracks – named after him in Abuja. Before this, the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, in a letter dated January 9, 2025 and addressed to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, announced the establishment of Bola Ahmed Tinubu Federal Polytechnic in Gwarinpa, the largest residential district in Abuja.

In March 2024, the Minna International Airport in Niger State was re-named after President Tinubu. This was even as it had earlier been named after a renowned literary figure and author of the classical Hausa fiction ‘Magana Jari Ce’ who also became the first indigenous editor of the first vernacular newspaper ‘Gaskiya Ta Fi Kobo’ in northern Nigeria; late Abubakar Imam. In May 2024, the president inaugurated the National Assembly Library and Resource Centre, named after him. Also in May 2024, the FCT minister named the Southern parkway after President Tinubu. And in December 2024, the Nigerian Immigration Service named its Command-and-Control Centre, the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Technology Innovation Complex.

Ordinarily, there’s nothing wrong with immortalising leaders who deserve to be recognised and remembered for their outstanding contributions and sacrifices to the development of the country. However, everything would be ethically wrong with it when such represents a show of egotism. These structures and institutions that have been named after President Tinubu are public institutions built with public funds. The fact that he is superintending over the processes that adopt his name for these public edifices raises a lot of moral questions.

It would be recalled that in 2003, the then Minister of Defence, Lt. General Theophilus Yakubu Danjuma (rtd) set up the Major General (rtd) Mobolaji Johnson-led committee to harmonise existing policies for the naming of military barracks and cantonments. The committee recommended that military barracks should be named after officers that have passed on, not the living. The committee’s recommendation was upheld and approval was granted for the renaming of Sani Abacha, Fort IBB, Yakubu Gowon and Gado Nasko barracks respectively to Mogadishu, Niger, Mambilla, and Lungi barracks; all located in Abuja. They were all alive as at the time the barracks were named after them. The only barracks which had a military officer’s name but was not changed is the Captain WU Bassey because he had died. He was the first Nigerian commissioned military officer and the first commandant of the Nigerian Military School (NMS). He served from 1954 to 1955.

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While Nigerians welcomed the report of the Mobolaji Johnson-led committee and wished that the policy was retained, at least, to protect and preserve the image of the Nigerian Military, Lt. Gen. Tukur Yusuf Buratai (rtd) came a few years later to ditch the policy when he named the military cantonment along Giri – Tunga Maje Road in Abuja after the then President Muhammadu Buhari. It would, thus, be a re-statement of the obvious that Nigeria’s present military high command which recently named military barracks in Abuja after President Tinubu was only admiring the former Chief of Army Staff, General Buratai, in the newly found culture of sycophancy in the military. It’s unfortunate that rather than have the courage to disown every unethical proposal such as naming barracks after a sitting president, today’s military authorities have lost institutional memory of credible policies that seek to preserve their decency and honour.

The fact that President Tinubu personally performs the inauguration of these immortalisation ceremonies suggests his passion for naming edifices after him. His refusal to either reject the offers or reverse them where he was not privy to the process further gives credence to public insinuation that he has a fixation for self-praise. The Nigerian nation should not be subservient to the whimsical desires of an individual or a select few. As a country, Nigeria is too big to revolve around a personality.

While we call for a quick halt at the ongoing rush for naming public institutions and structures after President Tinubu, we encourage heads of government establishments and institutions to be bold enough to veto any proposals brought to immortalise President Tinubu for the period he remains as Nigeria’s president. Being a recipient of the Grand Commander of the Federal Republic (GCFR) is enough recognition and respect for the decent office of President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Honours received when the honouree is not in any position to influence which, when, and how he should be honoured are held in higher esteem than when individuals, particularly public officers and political office holders, are recognised for any set of contributions to humanity while still in office. The best time to remember and recognise President Tinubu would be when he is no longer Nigeria’s president. Now isn’t the time.