Festus Keyamo (SAN), spokesperson for Bola Tinubu’s campaign council and minister of state for labor and employment, has criticized renowned novelist Chimamanda Adichie’s letter to US President Joe Biden.
Adichie wrote a letter to President Biden on Thursday, April 6, addressing the problems and irregularities that occurred during the 2023 presidential election on Saturday, February 25.
The election’s outcome sparked widespread outrage, with accusations ranging from a lack of functionality in the electronic transmission of results to violence, voter inducement, and a slew of other issues.
In a letter to President Joe Biden, the author of ‘Half of a Yellow Sun’ accused the US of undermining democratic standards and values by congratulating Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whom she accused of winning the presidential election fraudulently.
Keyamo, in a lengthy text seen by Legit.ng on his official Twitter page on Friday, April 7, reacted to this development by describing Adichie’s letter to President Biden as a reflection of colonial mentality.
Keyamo said:
“It is befuddling that someone often celebrated for using a God-given talent to promote our African values, will so tragically degrade that same ethos by penning a letter that is so petty, so grovelling in its tone in urging a single foreign power to withhold a mere congratulatory message to our President-elect as if that is what actually validates our own democratic identity. It reflects a pathetic colonial mentality.”
NIGERIA’S BURGEONING (NOT HOLLOW) DEMOCRACY – BY FESTUS KEYAMO, SAN
In global diplomacy and international relations, Presidents of countries make decisions and take actions about other countries’ affairs (albeit within the limits of sovereignty of States in International Law)…
— Festus Keyamo, SAN, CON, FCIArb (UK) (@fkeyamo) April 7, 2023
Similarly, Bayo Onanuga, the Tinubu/Shettima campaign’s director of media and publicity, downplayed the significance of Chimamanda’s letter.
According to Vanguard, Onanuga urged President Biden not to pay attention to the renowned novelist’s letter to him.
According to Onanuga, as quoted by TheCable:
“Dear President Joe Biden, please just trash the open letter by Chimamanda on Nigeria’s election once it gets to your desk. She wrote fiction, inspired by the monumental loss of her tribesman Peter Obi.”