By Mohammed Bello Doka
On the very same day that the Presidency was gasping for air over the damning FBI confirmation of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s criminal drug trafficking investigation, Defence Minister Christopher Musa appeared on national television to unleash a torrent of allegations against former Kaduna Governor Nasir El-Rufai. The timing could not have been more convenient. The choreography could not have been more desperate. And the Nigerian people should not be fooled for one second.
Let us state the facts plainly. On September 3, 2026, while the nation was still reeling from the FBI’s sworn declaration confirming that Tinubu was the subject of a criminal investigation into drug-trafficking crimes in the early 1990s, Bayo Onanuga, the President’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, issued a frantic statement insisting that there is no criminal case against President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, nor has the court found him guilty of any criminal wrongdoing. The statement reeked of panic. Onanuga tried desperately to spin a routine Freedom of Information Act dispute, but Nigerians are not stupid. The FBI does not investigate innocent men. The FBI does not produce 399 pages of redacted records for clean-handed citizens. And a US lobbying firm does not warn that a sitting president may face criminal charges after leaving office unless there is genuine fire beneath all this smoke.
Enter Christopher Musa, the Defence Minister who has done precious little to secure this nation since his appointment. On that same Thursday, Musa appeared on Channels Television’s Politics Today and accused El-Rufai of dividing Kaduna State along religious lines, of deliberately planning the killing of people in Southern Kaduna, of demolishing the houses of his personal enemies with bulldozers. He called El-Rufai arrogant and misguided. He praised Governor Uba Sani for dissolving the division. He spoke with the righteous fury of a man who has suddenly discovered a burning passion for national unity.
But here is the question that every Nigerian must ask: why now? Why is the Defence Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, a man whose primary responsibility is the security of 200 million citizens, suddenly acting like a political commentator dredging up the sins of a former governor? Why is he using his high office to wage a personal war against El-Rufai at the exact moment when his boss is drowning in the sea of public condemnation over those smelly drug trafficking folders? The answer is as transparent as it is shameful. This is a calculated distraction. The APC is terrified. They know that Nigerians are asking dangerous questions about Tinubu’s FBI files. They know that the opposition is demanding the full release of those records. They know that the 2027 elections are approaching and that this drug trafficking cloud could sink their ship. So they have deployed Musa to change the channel, to shift the national conversation from Tinubu’s criminal investigation to El-Rufai’s alleged misdeeds.
And what has Christopher Musa actually done as Defence Minister to deserve our attention? Let us examine his record. Since his appointment in December 2025, insecurity has worsened across Nigeria. Bandits continue to ravage communities in the North-West. Kidnappers operate with impunity, snatching innocent citizens from their homes and farms. Boko Haram and ISWAP may have been defeated according to Musa’s own hollow declaration on that same Channels interview, but try telling that to the families of victims in Borno and Yobe. Musa claims that terrorist attacks have declined, that the military is pushing into enemy enclaves, that kidnappings are now just a social ill where wives kidnap husbands. This is not leadership. This is gaslighting. This is a man who has failed to secure the country trying to convince us that the sky is green. The Muslim Rights Concern gave him until August 24 to resign or shape up. That ultimatum has passed, and Musa is still here, still failing, still talking.
The bitter irony is that Musa and his APC masters are now doing exactly what they accuse El-Rufai of doing. They are dividing Nigerians along religious and regional lines. They are exploiting our differences to deflect attention from their own corruption. Musa claims El-Rufai divided Kaduna into north and south, that southerners could not live in the north. But what is the APC doing today? They are using a Southern Kaduna general to attack a Northern politician, hoping to inflame regional passions, hoping that Nigerians will fight among themselves while the President’s smelly drug trafficking folders gather dust in a Washington courtroom. They are the ones sowing division now. They are the ones exploiting religion and ethnicity to save their sinking political fortunes.
Nigerians must refuse to be distracted. We must ask the hard questions that Musa and Onanuga are so desperate to avoid. Why was Bola Tinubu investigated by the FBI and DEA in the early 1990s? Why did he forfeit $460,000 in a civil case linked to drug trafficking? Why are US agencies invoking the Glomar defence to withhold records from the public? Why does a US lobbying firm believe that Tinubu may face criminal charges once he leaves office? These are not the questions of opposition politicians or foreign agents. These are the questions of every Nigerian who deserves to know the truth about the man who governs them.
And while we are asking questions, let us ask Christopher Musa directly. General, you have been Defence Minister for nearly nine months. Where are the results? Where is the security you promised? Why are bandits still killing and kidnapping with impunity? Why are our children still afraid to go to school? Why are our farmers still unable to return to their fields? You have time to appear on television to attack El-Rufai, but you have no time to secure the lives and property of Nigerians. You claim to have defeated terrorism, yet kidnapping is now a national epidemic. You claim to be a unifier, yet you are doing the bidding of a desperate political party that will say and do anything to bury the truth about its leader.
This is the moment for Nigerians to wake up. The APC is drowning, and they will grab at anything to stay afloat. They will throw El-Rufai under the bus. They will deploy ministers as attack dogs. They will try to divide us along every fault line they can find. But we must not let them. We must keep our eyes on the prize. We must continue to demand the full release of Tinubu’s FBI files. We must continue to ask why a man with such a shadowy past is leading our nation. We must refuse to be distracted by the theatrics of a failing government and a failing Defence Minister. The truth is coming. And no amount of political sleight of hand can stop it.
Mohammed Bello Doka is a Nigerian journalist, writer and media professional based in Abuja. His writing focuses on Nigerian politics, governance, security challenges and the country’s place within wider African and international affairs.
Doka has a particular interest in Northern Nigeria, democratic governance, regional security and the political and socioeconomic factors shaping contemporary Nigeria.
