The Monumental Ego: How Trump and Tinubu Turn Public Infrastructure Into Personal Billboards By Lawson Akhigbe

There was a time when nations had the decency to wait until a leader was safely six feet under or at the very least, out of office before plastering their name across state infrastructure. The unspoken rule of public memorials used to be simple: let history render its verdict first. If your legacy survived the passage of time without decaying into scandal, perhaps the state would name a secondary school or a modest bypass after you.

That era is dead. Today, public infrastructure isn’t built to serve citizens; it’s built to audition for the incumbent. Welcome to the Golden Age of Self-Aggrandizement, where state assets are carved up, renamed, and monogrammed in real-time.

From the avenues of Washington, D.C., to the dusty bypasses of Abuja, a contagious political virus is spreading among cabinet members, state governors, and agency heads: the urge to look into every bush and find something anything to name after the boss.

The Washington Playbook: Branding the Republic

To understand the global wave of executive branding, one must look at the blueprint laid down in Washington. During his second administration, Donald Trump elevated personal branding from a real estate tactic to an instrument of statecraft.

Why build a legacy when you can simply apply a coat of gold paint and write your name on the door?

Consider the scoreboard:

• The Trump Kennedy Center: After replacing the board of trustees and appointing himself chair, the board swiftly voted to rename the landmark the Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Because nothing says “cultural harmony” quite like co-authoring the Performing Arts Center.
• The “Department of War”: While formally renaming a Cabinet department requires an act of Congress, an executive order authorized the secondary title Department of War on official letterheads and press releases complete with a presidential seal.
• The Donald J. Trump United States Institute of Peace: In an irony that almost defies parody, the independent think tank dedicated to international conflict resolution was forcibly rebranded, its physical headquarters etched with the President’s name amidst a flurry of legal disputes.
• Trump-Class Battleships & F-47 Jets: From proposing a “Golden Fleet” anchored by Trump-class warships to designating the Air Force’s next-generation fighter jet as the F-47 (a nod to the 47th President), the armed forces have become a canvas for presidential vanity.

Add to this the Trump Gold Card visa, TrumpRx prescription platforms, and congressional bills proposing to strip George Washington and John Dulles of their namesake airports, and a clear pattern emerges. The state is no longer an abstract institution; it is a subsidiary of the executive’s personal brand.

The Abuja Echo: “Emi Lo Kan” in Concrete and Bronze

If Washington laid the groundwork for modern executive branding, Abuja has mastered the art of competitive flattery. Nigerian political appointees have observed the American trend and raised the stakes, turning ribbon-cutting ceremonies into high-stakes performance art.

In Nigeria, where political patronage is a blood sport, state governors and ministers have realized that concrete and bronze are the ultimate proof of loyalty. Rebranding a federal building isn’t just about honoring President Bola Ahmed Tinubu it’s job security wrapped in a red ribbon.

The “BAT” Rebranding Portfolio is already staggering:

• The Unfinished Highway: Works Minister Dave Umahi officially named the massive Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu Coastal Highway. The twist? The road is still actively under construction. We are no longer just naming completed projects after sitting leaders; we are naming blueprints.
• Erasing History in Minna: Niger State Governor Umar Bago stripped the name of indigenous literary giant Abubakar Imam off the Minna International Airport to rename it the Bola Ahmed Tinubu International Airport. In the race to score immediate political points in the capital, local cultural history was simply painted over.
• The Abuja Blitz: Federal Capital Territory Minister Nyesom Wike never one to be outdone in the theater of public gratitude bestowed Bola Ahmed Tinubu Way upon the newly completed Southern Parkway. Not far away, the iconic International Conference Centre was overhauled and rebranded as the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu ICC, complete with internal auditoriums sliced up to bear the names of other key administration figures.
• Acronymic Genius: The Nigeria Immigration Service unveiled the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Technology Innovation Complex yielding the acronym BATTIC, a construct so direct it practically winks at the reader.
• Baracks, Libraries, and Polytechnics: From the Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu Building at the National Assembly Library to the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Barracks in Asokoro, no sector of public life is safe from the monogramming machine.

The Mechanics of Sycophancy

Whether in D.C. or Abuja, the underlying psychology of this trend relies on three absurd dynamics:

1. Pre-Emptive Canonization: Historically, monuments were built to reflect a completed legacy. Naming active airports, uncompleted highways, and military hardware after a sitting incumbent turns public infrastructure into glorified campaign billboards paid for by taxpayers.
2. Appointee Auditions: Public officials know that loyalty expressed in words is cheap. Expressing loyalty by naming a $200 million public asset after your boss is how you survive the next cabinet reshuffle.
3. The Erasure of Collective Memory: Every time a government renames a library, an airport, or a cultural center to flatter the sitting president, it erases the civic history that came before it. We trade enduring cultural icons for transient political figures.

When governance devolves into a competitive search for unbranded asphalt, the citizen loses. Roads are left unpaved, airports function poorly, and public institutions decay but at least the sign at the gate looks magnificent.

Perhaps it’s time for a new rule of law: if a politician wants their name on a building, they should have to pay for the bricks out of their own pocket. Until then, we are all just extra set dressing in a leader’s monument to themselves.