Thirty one months into his 48-month tenure as President of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu last week unfolded the names of 32 nominees for ambassadorial postings. This action has sent many tongues wagging, and for several reasons.

Why did the president wait this long to appoint ambassadors? Nigeria will enter full political season as from January 2026. With less than 18 months for the non-career nominees to function, many of them will hardly have enough time to settle into their offices before Tinubu’s current tenure expires in 2027.

Some are also attributing the sudden decision to appoint ambassadors at this point to the pressures arising from United States President, Donald Trump’s military threat against perpetrators of Christian genocides and jihadist terror in Northern Nigeria.

Tinubu appears to prefer sharing his diplomatic shuttles between himself and Vice President Kashim Shettima instead of posting ambassadors to handle some of them. As of July 2025, he had travelled to about 20 countries to, according to him, strengthen diplomatic ties, shop for investment and address regional challenges. These are functions that ambassadors could easily handle while the president channels his focus on confronting our security and economic woes.

The most talked-about aspect of Tinubu’s ambassadorial nominations is the public records of some of them. The non-career ambassadors are mostly people who the president owes one political debt or the other to settle.

These include former Governors Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State and Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State, who were among the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, rebel governors led by former Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, who had since been rewarded with the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Abuja portfolio.

Surprising, if not shocking to many, were the names of some of Tinubu’s worst critics, Femi Fani-Kayode and Reno Omokri. Later, Omokri appeared to earn a fond place in Tinubu’s heart when he became a consistent traducer of major opposition figure, Peter Obi, while warming his way into Tinubu’s camp after the latter won the 2023 presidential election.

By far the most astonishing nomination was that of controversial immediate past Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, who left office barely a month ago. 

Some are renowned ethnic profilers. It is such an irony that such people are going to represent Nigeria in the world out there. Political patronage, rather than the nation’s higher interests, took the upper hand in the choice of many of the non-career nominees. That is unacceptable, and should be immediately corrected.