Before the ban of Eedris Abdulkareem’s new song, ‘Tell Your Papa,’ wherein he asked the President’s son, Seyi Tinubu, to talk to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu about the deplorable state of things in the country, many Nigerians were not even aware of the song. But the patently ‘eye service’ ban of the song by the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) aroused the citizens’ curiosity, drawing their attention to the song as well as affirming Eedris’s vocal dexterity in deploying the power inherent in music as a tool to shape society and combat bad governance.
Even as you read this, I still cannot fathom any reason for the ban other than overzealousness and the desire of some persons at NBC to play the good boy card and, ultimately, please some persons at the seat of power. The latest action of NBC reminds one of the sad reality of public officials’ penchant to please those in authority. If the song had not been about the president, I doubt NBC would have classified it as NTBB.
But let us move beyond the ban and look at the substance of Eedris’s song. The single is about the very sad state of things in President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Nigeria, and no amount of banning will change that fact.
Nothing new
There is hardship in the land. Over 133 million Nigerians, representing about 63 per cent of the country’s population, are multidimensionally poor. According to the 2023 Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (GMPI), 52.8% of households in Kebbi state are in severe poverty. The figure is 52.0% for Jigawa and 51.4% in Sokoto. Bauchi (50.8%), Zamfara (44.7%), Yobe (43.6%), Gombe (40.2%), Katsina (35.2%), Borno (31.2%), Kano (26.7%), Taraba (25.4%), and Niger (22.8%).
There is an alarmingly high unemployment rate. Hunger is on the horizon. Prices of essential commodities, including foodstuffs, have hit the rooftops. The 2024 Global Report on Food Crises, published by the Food Security Information Network, revealed that 24.9 million people battle acute hunger in Nigeria. The number is but a conservative estimate.
Security has continued to deteriorate. Attacks on communities and kidnapping for ransom have continued unabated. Borno, the epicentre of Boko Haram, is witnessing a resurgence of terrorist attacks. Governor Umara Zulum raised the alarm recently when he declared that the nation was losing ground. Earlier in the week, some yet-to-be-identified killers raided communities in Plateau State and killed about 50 persons. In 2014, President Tinubu, then an opposition leader, reminded then-President Goodluck that “on matters of security, the buck stops on the president’s table… the unending attacks suggest a failure of intelligence. Government must rethink its strategy now.” And I ask about the recurring killings: What is the president doing?
Eedris did not say anything new. Writers have, in their write-ups, been harping on what Idris complained about in his song, week in, week out. Market women have been lamenting it on their way to and from the market and even inside their shops in the market, especially on days when sales are low, and they now have more of such days. Students too discuss it in between lectures and in their respective hostels. Lecturers whose take-home pay cannot take them home are, on a daily basis, lamenting over the same thing Eedris sang about. Nigerians who, like Eedris, have been lamenting the deplorable state of things are, by far, more than the insignificant percentage that are comfortable with the current state of things. Eedris would have betrayed his calling as an artist if he had watched idly without saying anything. Pure and simple!
In banning Eedris’s song, NBC is not only promoting him as an erudite musical activist whose ability to harness music as a tool to criticize bad governance is legendary.
Fundamentally, NBC has succeeded in doing more to help Eedris’ song gain wider acceptability because it failed to realise that there is an alternative. Since social media has more capacity for the dissemination of information globally, the ban is just a waste of time. To put it mildly, if the intent is to limit the number of persons who will listen to the song—and that is what it is—then NBC’s ban is an exercise in futility.
Does NBC need to be reminded that it lacks the capacity to regulate and/or ban the use of content on social media? And to the elation of those who support free speech, social media now boasts more audience and traction than the conventional media that NBC has questionable control over.
The Commission is not only incurring the wrath of a greater number of Nigerians, but it has also exposed itself as a sycophant institution that exists to please those in authority.
Situational irony
As NBC must have known, the song it banned is now viral on all social media entertainment platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, among others. Ironically, NBC’s move to limit the song has succeeded in making it gain more traction. Despite the ban, the protest track has experienced the Streisand effect—a phenomenon in which attempts to suppress information only serve to publicise it more widely. The Streisand effect is named after the incident when singer Barbra Streisand sued a photographer to remove a specific image from the internet, which ironically led to the image gaining even more notoriety.
Eedris’s song has gained widespread attention and gone viral on social media. It has amassed over 85,000 views and more than 2,800 likes on YouTube, up from the initial 22,754 views and 1,200 likes on YouTube. On Spotify, it has also recorded over 30,000 streams. Unfortunately for NBC, there is nothing it can do to stop it. The song is trending virally online, and NBC has no control over it. The fact is that NBC succeeded in attracting more people to the song.
NBC, in its bid to curry favour, must be wary of creating the impression that it is anti-democracy. The beauty of democracy is in the freedom that it guarantees. Anyone or agency that attempts to deprive people of this very salient feature of democracy must be called out. That is why all Nigerians of good conscience must condemn NBC’s ban, regardless of the fact that it turned out to be ineffective.
But will the NBC listen? It is notorious for this. From imposing unnecessary and clearly unjustified fines on media houses that are barely struggling to survive under the very toxic operating environment to needlessly classifying some songs as NTBB, the nation’s broadcast regulator has presented itself as an instrument of autocracy. Well, NBC claims the broadcast code guides it. The time is ripe for the code to undergo amendment.
NBC should not use archaic laws to act in ways that suggest it is trying to take Nigeria back to the dark ages. Nothing justifies a government agency’s decision to act in ways that suggest attempts to limit free speech. The fundamental right to freedom of speech is inalienable. Those who feel maligned by Idris’ song should go to court.
It must be noted that NBC’s decision tends to portray the current administration as averse to criticism and, above all, bent on limiting freedom of speech. To that extent, the government must beat NBC to the line because, like Wole Soyinka said, “Any government that is tolerant only of yes-men and women, which accommodates only praise singers and dancers to the official beat, has already commenced a downhill slide into the abyss”.
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