If gaslighting were an Olympic sport, Nigeria’s Federal Capital Territory Minister, Nyesom “Yes Daddy” Wike, would not just win gold—he’d redesign the medal, revoke everyone else’s certificate of participation, and accuse them of not following due process in collecting the medals he already seized.
Wike has reached a level of political enlightenment where self-awareness is no longer necessary. Like Trump, his spiritual cousin in the art of projection, Wike has perfected the ancient craft of accusing others of offences he is busy committing in broad daylight, under camera lights, with a backup generator humming behind him.
Take due process. Ah yes—those sweet, delicate words he sprinkles like seasoning on his public pronouncements.
In Wike’s world, due process is like NEPA light: available only when he wants it, inaccessible when others need it. He warns Nigerians, “Follow due process!” with the same voice a parent uses to warn a child not to touch a hot stove—while he himself is leaning casually on the stove, frying plantain for the next revocation announcement.
Every morning, Abuja residents wake up and check their occupancy certificates the way Lagosians check the weather—Has Wike revoked it yet? If not, congratulations! You have 24 more hours of temporary peace before His Eminence, the Emperor of FCT, exercises his wrist with another signature. The man signs revocations the way banks send OTPs: automatically, frequently, and without emotional consideration.
Yet Wike still lectures others about “not following established procedures.”
Established by who?
Procedures approved by where?
Documented by which spirit?
Because one thing is sure—no one has seen this rulebook except Wike and possibly the ancestors.
And then there’s the loyalty matter.
Wike loves loyalty the way a mosquito loves an exposed ankle—but only your loyalty, never his. This is a man who has turned political hopping into a gymnastics routine. If political loyalty was a marriage vow, Wike would have “open relationship” written into the contract. He wants loyalty the way politicians want campaign donations: permanently from others, temporarily from himself.
He accuses opponents of betrayal with the confidence of a man who has never kept the same political mood for more than six months. If loyalty required a certificate, Wike would revoke his own by accident while signing someone else’s.
But the true comedy is Wike’s conviction that he is the only custodian of order in Abuja—Nigeria’s capital and now his personal fiefdom. He sits on that elevated press conference throne, eyeing journalists like a judge at the Supreme Court of Vibes and Selective Due Process.
He doesn’t need a constitution.
He doesn’t need precedents.
He doesn’t even need logic.
He just needs his chair, his swagger, and his sense of eternal correctness.
If Abuja were a kingdom, Wike would be the benevolent dictator who revokes lands during breakfast, scolds you for not respecting the rules during lunch, and blames your disobedience for his dinner indigestion.
In the end, Wike is not just gaslighting—he has industrialized it. Abuja is the factory, and certificates are the raw materials.
If you live in the FCT, keep your documents laminated, your loyalty negotiable, and your due process prayer points ready.
Because when Wike says:
“I am only enforcing the law,”
what he really means is:
“I am the law. Everyone else is the offence.”
Centre for Nigeria Progress 