Bayo Onanuga, the spokesman for President-elect Bola Tinubu, has urged U.S. President Joe Biden to trash Chimamanda Adichie’s open letter requesting the American leader to hold off on congratulating Mr Tinubu as Nigeria’s next president, as doing so could legitimise what she described as an “illegitimate process” that led to his victory.
According to Mr Onanuga, Ms Adichie’s open letter to the U.S. president is based on ethnic sympathy and fiction.
“Congratulating its (election) outcome, President Biden tarnishes America’s self-proclaimed commitment to democracy,” Ms Adichie, a celebrated Nigerian author, said in a letter titled ‘Nigeria’s Hollow Democracy’ published in The Atlantic on Thursday.
Reacting to Ms Adichie’s letter on Thursday in a tweet, Mr Onanuga urged the U.S. president to “trash” the letter, which he described as “fiction.”
“Dear President Joe Biden, please just trash the open letter by Chimamanda on Nigeria’s election once it gets to your desk,” Mr Onanuga stated.
The APC propagandist added, “She wrote fiction, inspired by the monumental loss of her tribesman Peter Obi.”
Ms Adichie cautioned the U.S. leader against toeing the path of his UK counterpart, Rishi Sunak, who had rushed to congratulate Mr Tinubu, stressing that “the battle for influence in Africa will not be won by supporting the same undemocratic processes for which China is criticised.”
Foreign experts, including retired American diplomat Johnnie Carson, also welcomed Mr Tinubu’s victory, saying he put in the resources and groundwork to attain history.
Still, Mr Carson said the election that produced Mr Tinubu could have been better conducted.
“To me, the problem is not with Tinubu and the other candidates,” he said. “Nigeria deserves the very best electoral process.”
Leading opposition parties, Labour and PDP, have filed petitions against Mr Tinubu’s election in court in a tedious proceeding that should get to the Supreme Court in eight months.
