By Tamuno Pedro
Omoyele Sowore has a knack for sparking outrage and dominating headlines. With an uncanny ability to tap into the pulse of the moment, he expertly channels public frustration into a media frenzy. You have to give him credit for that. However, it seems this time his strategy has not quite paid off, and the headlines are not going his way. Something is off.
You know you are in trouble when your biggest protest is against the media. That is where our man Sowore found himself. Yesterday, he took a swip on the Nigerian media because, according to Sowore, they are not giving him the time of day.
This is the curious position in which Mr. Omoyele Sowore now finds himself. On the eve of his much publicised protest for the release of Nnamdi Kanu, scheduled for the 20th of October, the activist has trained his fire not on the state, but on the Nigerian media, accusing it of a conspicuous lack of interest.
This pivot from campaigner to critic of the fourth estate is as revealing as it is misguided. Mr. Sowore, himself a publisher, ought to understand that the Nigerian media is not swayed by sentiment alone. Its editorial judgements are, and must be, based on the tangible substance and demonstrable resonance of a story. The institutions he now castigates are the very same that have documented the protracted Kanu saga with due diligence. They are the same outlets that have, at various junctures, held the government’s feet to the fire over its handling of the case.
The media’s role has not altered; the nature of Sowore’s current campaign, however, appears to have failed the test of newsworthiness. The onus, therefore, does not lie with the press to manufacture an audience, but with the architects of the protest to command one. The silence he laments is not an editorial omission, but a stark verdict on the appeal of his cause.
This is an issue that requires deeper reflection and soul-searching for Sowore. With that in mind, let us examine the underlying issues.
Sowore is a man who has built a career on understanding the mechanics of public sentiment. He knows which levers to pull, which nerves to press, and which headlines will generate the most heat to help him position himself as the sole voice of resolution. His sudden Free Nnamdi Kanu is the pinnacle of this strategy. It is high on drama, brimming with the kind of righteous fury that plays well on social media feeds, and entirely devoid of the moral courage required to confront the full, ugly truth.
And what is that truth? It is a truth that Sowore’s clean narrative desperately tries to ignore. It is the truth of a region brought to its knees by a reign of terror enforced in the very name for which he now campaigns. While Sowore speaks of the injustice of a single detention, he deliberately sidesteps the collective pains endured by millions. He demands freedom for one man, while remaining conspicuously silent about the years of fear, economic strangulation, and bloodshed that have trapped an entire population. What about the victims of these ugly years?
These are the contexts that Sowore wilfully erased. For years, the people of the Southeast lived under the gun. The sit-at-home orders, which began as a political tool, metastasised into a system of pure terror. They were not requests; they were threats, enforced by the sight of burned-out cars and the stories of those who were brutalised for defiance. The economy of a vibrant region was deliberately and systematically shattered. Parents kept their children home, not for safety from a pandemic, but from the bullets of enforcers. Market women, the bedrock of the local economy, faced the impossible choice between feeding their families and risking their lives.
Can anyone recall the national protests Sowore led against this terror? Where was the fiery orator when schools were shut down and futures were put on hold? Where was the relentless campaigner when ordinary Igbo men and women were being labelled “saboteurs” and hunted down in their own communities? The silence was deafening. It was a silence that spoke volumes about the selectivity of his outrage. It revealed a hierarchy of victimhood in his political calculus, where the detention of a leader in a comfortable Abuja cell is a cause for national mobilisation, while the daily terrorization of millions is merely a regional issue, unworthy of his national stage.
Sowore is, above all, a political entrepreneur. He has long eyed the presidency, and he understands the hard numbers of Nigerian politics. The passionate, geographically concentrated support that simmers around the figure of Nnamdi Kanu represents a potent, ready-made political army. It is a bloc of votes, a well of viral energy, and a platform for national relevance that any outsider politician would covet. By anointing himself the “last man standing” for Kanu’s release, Sowore is making a naked bid for this constituency. He is not building a movement; he is poaching one.
His language meticulously betrays this intent. Notice he never ventures into the difficult terrain of “reconciliation,” “accountability,” or “restorative justice.” Those concepts are messy. They require acknowledging that wrongs were committed on all sides. They force a conversation about the burned police stations, the murdered security personnel, and the extorted businessmen. Instead, Sowore wields the word “justice.” It is a brilliant, if morally bankrupt, rhetorical shield. “Justice” is simple, emotionally charged, and absolves him of the need to address the complexities on the ground. It is the language of a political rally, not of a genuine healing process. It is designed to mobilise, not to reconcile.
The most unforgivable sin of this cynical campaign is its utter erasure of the victims. True, lasting peace is not built on the unilateral release of a provocateur. Real justice must be centered on those who have lost everything—their livelihoods, their loved ones, their sense of security. The charred skeletons of buses on the Enugu-Port Harcourt road are not metaphors; they are the graves of people’s dreams. The unmarked graves scattered across the countryside hold not just bodies, but unacknowledged grief. The deep-seated trauma of a community that learned to live with the sound of gunfire is a wound that no hashtag can heal.
What does Sowore’s brand of “justice” offer the widow of the policeman killed at a fake checkpoint? What solace does it bring to the family of the student shot for writing an exam? The brutal, unspoken message of this protest is that their pain is collateral damage. Their suffering is an acceptable price to pay for the larger political objective of freeing Kanu and, in the process, boosting Sowore’s electoral prospects. This is not justice; it is a profound betrayal of the very concept.
The chorus of support from political veterans like Atiku Abubakar and Goodluck Jonathan only adds a layer of farce to the tragedy. Let us not pretend for a second that their endorsement is rooted in principle. For them, the #FreeNnamdiKanu movement is a convenient and cost-free political weapon. It is a way to posture as defenders of liberty, annoy the sitting government, and flirt with a significant voting bloc, all without getting their hands dirty in the arduous work of actual reconciliation. Their involvement is a poison pill, transforming a deep national wound into a petty partisan battlefield. It confirms that for Nigeria’s political elite, human suffering is just another currency to be traded.
Sowore’s proposed protest is a monument to political opportunism. It is a campaign that prioritizes headlines over healing, ambition over accountability, and the liberation of a leader over the redemption of a people. The crisis in the Southeast is a deep, festering wound that requires the careful, patient hands of a surgeon. It demands a process of truth and reconciliation that acknowledges every victim, that demands accountability from every perpetrator, and that places the healing of the community above the triumph of any individual.
Sowore offers a sledgehammer. He offers a dangerous shortcut that promises not peace, but a deeper, more permanent rupture. His is a protest of convenience, designed for trending topics. Until his advocacy finds the courage to encompass the full, painful truth—until it amplifies the voices of all who have suffered, not just the one in detention—it will remain what it so transparently is: a political strategy masquerading as a moral crusade. And the Nigerian people, in their wisdom, can see the difference.
Pedro Wrote from Port Harcourt
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