Nkiruka Nistoran, publisher at NN News Media, took to his X (formerly Twitter) handle to rebut comments made by Bayo Onanuga, Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Information and Strategy.
Onanuga had claimed in an interview with Trust Radio that some politicians are targeting President Tinubu simply because he is from the South, dismissing accusations of northern marginalization as “politically motivated lies”. He argued that Tinubu deserves the same two-term opportunity as his predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari, and urged northern politicians to wait their turn, just as southerners did during Buhari’s eight-year rule.
Responding directly to these remarks, Nistoran wrote:
“There is nothing like ‘South’; Emilokan represents the South-West. So, @aonanuga1956 is a propagandist and cannot justify his claim after backing a northern candidate, Buhari, to remove a southerner, Jonathan. Those of us from the South-East and South-South aren’t buying into this political charade.”
Her statement underscores a growing sentiment among some southern Nigerians who feel that the Emilokan slogan popularized during Tinubu’s campaign was never meant to represent the broader southern region, but rather the Yoruba-dominated South-West.
Nistoran’s critique also calls out what she sees as hypocrisy in Onanuga’s defense of Tinubu, pointing to his past support for Buhari, a northern candidate to removed then-President Goodluck Jonathan from the South-South.
The exchange reflects deeper tensions within Nigeria’s political landscape, where regional identity and power rotation remain contentious issues. While Onanuga insists that Tinubu’s administration has appointed Northerners to key security roles and is working to improve infrastructure nationwide, critics like Nistoran argue that symbolic gestures and selective narratives cannot mask underlying political imbalances
