by Mohammed Bello Doka
28 May, 2026.
There is a bizarre role reversal unfolding in Nigeria, and it is not a comedy skit. It is a tragedy playing out in real time. The ruling class has abandoned its basic functions, creating a political vacuum where the government behaves like a destructive opposition party, and the opposition behaves like a disoriented ruling party that lost its mandate. The reason for this strange swap is simple but profound: the people in government today spent so many years in the opposition that they never learned how to govern. And those in opposition today spent so many years in government that they have forgotten how to be an opposition. While they swap roles for the cameras, the ordinary Nigerian is left paying the price with blood, sweat, and empty pockets.
The government, which holds the coercive powers of the state and the mandate to govern, has abandoned its responsibility to manage the commonwealth. Having spent decades in the wilderness complaining, they now find themselves in power but still behaving like protesters. Instead of solving problems, they spend their energy blaming everyone but themselves. When the budget fails to execute, as seen with the zero capital release to the Interior Ministry in 2025, the government offers excuses rather than accountability. When farmers lament the loss of over 500,000 hectares of rice and maize to floods and insecurity, the response is often silence or shifting the goalposts. Rather than owning the inflation that has driven the cost of living through the roof, the administration points fingers at global oil shocks or previous administrations. A government that governs fixes roads; a government that acts like an opposition blames the past for every pothole in the present.
Furthermore, the ruling party has seemingly forgotten that its primary duty is to allocate resources for capital projects. Instead, the treasury is being treated as a war chest for political bribery and control. We are witnessing a disturbing trend where public funds, including Federation Account Allocation Committee allocations, are allegedly diverted to lure governors and legislators into line. The African Democratic Congress recently accused APC governors of diverting over N800 billion meant for development into political machinations for 2027. Meanwhile, commissions like the South-East Development Commission reportedly received just N5 billion of its 2025 allocation and spent a bulk of it not on eroding gullies, but on stakeholder engagement and investment promotion. When governance funds become slush funds for political horse-trading, the government is no longer a ruling party; it is an occupying force running a bazaar. This is what happens when opposition habits die hard: you fight to capture the state, but once captured, you have no idea what to do with it except keep fighting.
Most damning is the government’s security strategy. Bandits and insurgents continue to terrorize the food belts, and farmers are fleeing their lands. Yet the administration seems more preoccupied with silencing journalists and hunting political opponents than hunting terrorists. Just days ago, the International Press Institute had to call on the President to rein in Niger State Governor Bago over a pattern of attacks on journalists, including the physical assault of an NTA reporter and the detention of others who asked tough questions. In Rivers State, armed thugs shut down an Arise TV live broadcast, seizing equipment because they did not like the political narrative. The government’s security apparatus is supposed to protect lives and property, yet it is increasingly deployed to protect fragile egos and suppress dissent. This is the hallmark of an opposition movement trying to destabilize a regime, not a government trying to secure a nation. When you have spent years as the opposition accusing the government of brutality, you do not suddenly learn how to wield state power with wisdom.
Additionally, instead of convincing the people through performance, the government has resorted to ethnocentrism and tribal jingoism, dividing the populace along fault lines to distract from its failures. They brand their critics as enemies of the state and use divisive rhetoric to maintain a base. When the government spends more time labeling the opposition as saboteurs than fixing the grid, it is acting like a rabble-rousing opposition leader, not a statesman. Again, this is the muscle memory of opposition politics: attack, divide, and blame.
On the other side of the aisle, the opposition is no better. They have the mandate to challenge the government, present alternatives, and unite the people for rescue. But the people in opposition today spent years in government, enjoying the privileges of power, and they have forgotten how to fight from the outside. Instead of offering a coherent challenge, they are busy fighting each other over the carcass of power before the election is even won. The recent primaries and coalition talks have become circuses of ego and avarice. Atiku Abubakar recently lamented that the opposition is in shambles, but one must look at the internal rot. In Osun State, a relative of a sitting governor is accused of collecting N200 million from a senatorial aspirant to influence a primary ticket. The opposition is spending more money on buying delegates and fighting legal battles over who becomes the flag bearer than on designing policies to tackle hunger.
They are currently fighting over the animal that is already in the bush. They are arguing about zoning, percentages, and who gets what ministerial slot in a cabinet that does not yet exist, while the animal, the actual power to serve the people, runs wild in the forest of insecurity. Instead of uniting the people against a failing government, the opposition leaders are uniting their factions against each other. Instead of presenting a shadow budget or a technical committee to fight inflation, they are spending millions on primary election logistics and legal fees to contest nomination papers. They are acting like a government that has already won, burdened by the spoils of office and obsessed with internal allocation of positions, rather than a hungry opposition desperate to offer relief. This is what happens when you spend too long in government: you forget how to protest, how to mobilize the masses, and how to offer a simple, compelling alternative.
The greatest losers in this bizarre swap of roles are not the politicians. They will eat, whether they are in government or opposition. The losers are the ordinary Nigerians. While the government plays the blame game, food inflation is eroding the fabric of the home. It now costs over N30,000 to cook a pot of jollof rice for a family, and diesel prices above N1,500 per litre have made transportation a luxury. While the opposition plays musical chairs with party tickets, bandits are chasing farmers off their lands, leading to a projected N15 trillion annual loss in food imports. The Nigerian people are bleeding, hungry, and stranded. Until the government learns to govern and the opposition relearns how to oppose, the nation will remain stuck in this tragic theatre where everyone is playing the wrong role, and the ordinary citizen is the collateral damage.
Mohammed Bello Doka can be reached via [email protected]
Abuja Network News
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Opinion