The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has berated the Federal Government for allegedly engaging a United States ( US) firm to launder its image and lobby Americans on its behalf for a whopping $9 million
The ADC, in a statement by its interim National Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi, on Wednesday – today, January 14, 2026 – described the lobbying project as a misplacement of priority by the federal government.
The opposition party stated that the government is attempting to launder its image abroad, at a time when Nigerians are grappling with worsening insecurity and economic hardship, with thousands of citizens already killed and millions unable to afford basic necessities of life.
The Tinubu Administration reportedly procured the services of lobbyists in the US, at the sum of $9 million to help communicate the efforts of the government to protect Christians in the country and combat terrorism.
The US President Donald Trump, recently, took exemption to the killings of Christians in the country by terror groups and threatened to come into the country “gun a blazing”.
On December 24, 2025, the US launched an assault on terrorists’ locations in Sokoto, with President Trump, who designated Nigeria a country of particular concern, threatening to authorize more strikes in Nigeria, if the killing of Christians continued.
The ADC accused the Tinubu Administration of deploying scarce resources abroad to launder its image, instead of tackling the economic and security crisis in the country.
The opposition party noted that “no government in Africa has ever committed such an obscene sum to a short-term public relations exercise. While the ADC recognises the importance of representing Nigeria’s interests internationally, spending $9 million on image management at a time when millions of Nigerians cannot afford food, fuel, or basic healthcare is a clear case of misplaced priorities and moral blindness.”
“This decision is also an admission of diplomatic failure. A government that has left key ambassadorial positions vacant now seeks to outsource diplomacy to lobbyists, further weakening Nigeria’s institutional credibility and reducing foreign policy to transactional propaganda,” the national coalition party emphasized.
According to the ADC, “more troubling is the illusion that paid lobbying in Washington can erase the reality of mass killings, widespread insecurity, and state failure at home.”
“No amount of image laundering can wash away the blood of thousands of Nigerians killed under this administration’s watch,” ADC warned.
“Lobbying to impress foreign leaders cannot substitute for a coherent strategy to end the bloodbath. A President who declares a state of emergency on security and then proceeds on foreign holidays cannot be rescued by public relations firms.
“Equally dangerous is the framing of this lobbying effort as a campaign to ‘communicate Christian protection efforts.’ This risks deepening sectarian tensions and politicising security in a country already strained by religious and ethnic fault lines. Security failures affect all Nigerians, regardless of faith, and cannot be addressed through selective messaging abroad instead of justice, accountability, and effective governance at home.”
The Senator David Mark-led opposition party argued that what the country needs is leadership and not propaganda, adding that “resources should be spent protecting lives, restoring trust in state institutions, and rebuilding a country in distress, not polishing the image of a government that has failed in its most basic responsibility: the protection of lives and property.”
