An administration cannot demand patriotic silence while departing from the standards that make nations credible.
By Kenneth Chibuogwu Gbandi
The Presidency’s latest warning that Nigerians abroad must not “demarket” their country is built on a dangerous misunderstanding of patriotism.
Speaking through his Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila, at the Nigeria Diaspora Economic Conference in Toronto, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu acknowledged that citizens may criticise government and demand better results, but warned against conduct capable of harming Nigeria’s institutions, peace or economic future. On one point, we agree: Nigeria must always come before party politics. But that principle binds those who exercise power even more than those who question it.
The Nigerian diaspora is not Nigeria’s reputational liability. It is one of the country’s greatest strategic assets. Across Europe, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, Nigerians build hospitals, lead technology firms, teach in universities, run businesses, serve in public institutions and remit billions of dollars to support families and the national economy. They carry Nigeria’s talent into rooms the Nigerian state often struggles to enter.
To ask these citizens to invest their money, expertise and international networks while treating their honest criticism as economic sabotage is not partnership. It is an attempt to collect the dividends of the diaspora while rejecting its democratic voice.
Nations are not demarketed by citizens who tell the truth. They are demarketed when public institutions repeatedly generate headlines that no patriotic speech can erase.
Nigeria’s image is damaged when a fictitious body can acquire the appearance of federal legitimacy, obtain office space within the Federal Secretariat, open accounts and appear in the 2026 budget with a reported ₦1.3 billion allocation. The Presidency says its Chief of Staff’s signature was forged and has ordered an anti-corruption investigation. Those denials and proceedings must be respected. But the central institutional question remains: how did an entity without legal existence pass through so many gates of government?
That question is not an opposition slogan. It is a test of the controls by which a serious state protects its name, treasury and diplomatic standing.
Nigeria is demarketed when the Senate Public Accounts Committee must demand supporting schedules for approximately ₦107 trillion in receivables and ₦103 trillion in payables contained in the audited accounts of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited. The Senate has carefully stated that it is not alleging that ₦210 trillion is missing; it says the enormous figures remain unexplained and unreconciled. That distinction matters. But in any jurisdiction governed by best international practice, the inability of a wholly state-owned enterprise and its auditors to promptly explain figures of such magnitude would itself constitute a grave governance failure.
Nigeria is demarketed when lawmakers identify multiple versions of major tax legislation and a House committee reports discrepancies between what the National Assembly passed and what appeared in the official gazette. Tax reform may be necessary, but no reform can command investor confidence when businesses and citizens cannot be certain that the text being enforced is the text lawfully enacted. Legal certainty is not a technical luxury. It is the foundation upon which investment decisions are made.
Nigeria is demarketed when international reporting raises legitimate questions about the concentration of roughly $20 billion worth of major public projects among companies linked to Gilbert Chagoury, a longstanding associate of the President. Let us be precise: this is not evidence that $20 billion of Nigeria’s foreign reserves “vanished into” anyone’s pocket. It is, however, a serious question about procurement, competition, disclosure, value for money and the appearance of preferential access. The proper response is not outrage at the messenger. It is full publication of the procurement processes, beneficial interests, financing arrangements, performance benchmarks and safeguards against conflicts of interest.
Sunlight is cheaper than propaganda and far more persuasive.
Nigeria is also demarketed when appointments to public trust appear to reward political loyalty despite unresolved allegations concerning credentials, integrity or criminal conduct; when electoral reforms appear to weaken rather than deepen transparency; when citizens are told that painful economic measures are indispensable while elite expenditure remains insufficiently restrained; and when investigations multiply but convincing consequences remain rare.
Not every allegation is true. Not every controversy proves wrongdoing. Fairness demands that we distinguish accusation from evidence and inquiry from conviction. Yet responsible government requires more than repeating denials. It requires institutions strong enough to establish the facts promptly, publish them transparently and impose consequences without fear or favour.
The Presidency cannot reasonably ask Nigerians overseas to present a polished national image while the federal government resists the practices that sustain credibility abroad: open competitive procurement, independently audited accounts, legislative integrity, judicial independence, verifiable credentials, conflict-of-interest rules, freedom of expression and visible consequences for misconduct.
This matters economically. Investors do not commit capital because citizens speak softly. They invest when contracts are enforceable, laws are predictable, regulators are independent, public accounts are intelligible and political connections do not determine commercial outcomes. Reputation is not manufactured by public relations. It is the accumulated result of institutional behaviour.
As a Nigerian who has spent decades organising and representing our people in Europe, I know that diaspora Nigerians defend the country every day. We correct stereotypes. We promote Nigerian enterprise. We mobilise professional networks. We encourage investment, tourism and knowledge transfer. We support relatives, communities and development initiatives, frequently performing social functions that government has neglected.
But we cannot be conscripted into silence.
Our loyalty is to Nigeria, not to the temporary occupants of office. Governments come and go; the nation remains. Indeed, the constitutional duty of citizenship includes demanding that those entrusted with national power account for its use. When diaspora Nigerians insist on credible elections, transparent budgeting, competent appointments and the rule of law, they are not attacking Nigeria. They are defending the Nigeria that ought to be.
The administration should therefore replace accusation with engagement. Publish the facts behind the scandals. Empower genuinely independent investigations. Protect legislative texts from alteration. Reconcile the NNPC accounts in public. Disclose the procurement and financing details of mega-projects. Strengthen electoral transparency. Appoint on merit. Enforce consequences. And create a permanent, non-partisan mechanism through which diaspora professionals can scrutinise policy and contribute expertise without being treated as political adversaries.
That would be patriotism in government.
Nigeria cannot rebuke its way into a better reputation. It cannot demand investment without accountability, applause without performance or loyalty without truth. The country’s flag is not protected by concealing stains; it is protected by removing them.
My reply to the Presidency is therefore direct: Nigerians in the diaspora are not demarketing Nigeria by calling for better governance. The institution doing the greatest damage to Nigeria’s standing is a federal government that too often falls short of best international practices and then blames those who notice.
If the Presidency wants Nigerians abroad to market the country with greater confidence, it should give them a product worthy of their advocacy: a Nigeria governed by transparency, competence, justice and consequences.
That is not hostility to Nigeria. It is hope disciplined by truth.
Hon. Kenneth Chibuogwu Gbandi is the longest-serving former Continental Chairman of Nigerians in Diaspora Organisation Europe (NIDOE), a former member of its Board of Trustees, and a former Coordinating Chairman of NIDO Worldwide. NIDO is one of the world’s largest African diaspora professional networks and is institutionally recognised by the Nigerian government. He currently serves as Chairman of the African Democratic Congress–Diaspora Network (ADC-DN).
