Human rights activist and former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) Omoyele Sowore has said he refuses to compromise his values for political gain, warning that Nigeria has become “a burial ground for good-intentioned people” where evil is more likely to thrive than virtue.
During an interview on Noble Nigeria hosted by Noble Eyisi, Sowore explained his principled stance on not aligning with political godfathers in order to win power.
“It’s not just about gaining power to do good,” Sowore said. “I want to gain power to sustain good people who have gained power thinking they can do good. But Nigeria consumes them. Evil has taken over this country… not in a religious sense, but general evil.”
“No Consequences for Doing Evil in Nigeria”
Sowore lamented the lack of accountability in Nigeria’s political system, suggesting that the country rewards the corrupt while punishing the upright.
“The only consequences we have here are against those who do good, not those who do evil,” he said. “All the evil men I’ve known since I was born have lasted longer than the good ones. They build the best mansions, drive the nicest cars. But every weekend, you hear a good man is dead — the teacher who did his work, the honest policeman, the customs officer who didn’t take a bribe.”
He added that good people often die in poverty or disgrace, while the corrupt thrive in comfort and power.
When asked whether he still believes he could become president one day, Sowore recalled the many unlikely twists in his life and political journey, emphasising that while he is a “fundamental pessimist,” he still holds on to hope.
“If you sat with me in 1994, you would swear I’d never graduate. But I did. If anyone told you I’d live beyond 25, you wouldn’t believe it. I’m 54 now,” he said. “Stuff can happen in such a way that it’s not just me — a lot of people could rise. Abacha died suddenly, and the same can happen again.”
‘Peter Obi Was Packaged by the Elite’
On the subject of Peter Obi, Sowore was unflinching. He described the former Anambra State governor as a “packaged” candidate promoted by the elite to hijack the energy of the #EndSARS movement.
“After #EndSARS, the youth were ripe for power. But the elites knew they had to insert someone they could talk to,” Sowore claimed. “So they gave them Obi, and it was all packaging.”
According to Sowore, Obi is not the revolutionary some people think he is.
Sowore also accused Obi’s supporters of waging an aggressive information campaign and using social media to silence dissenting voices.
“Obi was portrayed as the face of the youth struggle, but it was a tyranny of the minority,” he said. “Even Wole Soyinka told me he almost fell for it up to a point. He said I was almost endorsing this guy. And then he woke up one day and his name was all over, and he said he was asking, what did I do wrong? What did I do wrong? It turns out they just picked on him for no reason. And even though he didn’t participate in the election, he became the most ridiculed person after the election. That was what got him upset. And he said, ‘Oh, if this is my last assignment on earth, I’m going to let people know who you people are.’”
Recounting his own encounters with Obi, Sowore shared personal stories of what he described as hypocrisy and stagecraft.
“When we were running for election, I noticed something about him. If Peter wants to take a private jet, he will go and enter through commercial place and greet everybody. You think? And then they will bring a vehicle and put him to go to the private jet area,” he said.
He narrated how Obi would then switch to the VIP lounge for a private jet.
“I was actually expecting that he was driving Innoson motors,” he said.
“Peter Obi had nothing less than 10 big Toyota SUVs waiting for him. And I was telling myself, why do you have to lie? So why do you have to cover up for this? Nobody’s going to be upset with you that you are a presidential candidate if you have a convoy.
“But look at this trajectory, and that packaging is his style. And if you want to get away with finding out, then he’ll send his people after you.”
“I knew him and he knew that I knew him. But there were guys who were against him in those days who didn’t have the courage to come out again, because they were afraid of the backlash, and they did a fantastic job of scaring everybody,” he said.
Sowore narrated how Obi once publicly praised him for helping him become governor, but later allowed his associates to smear him and novelist Okey Ndibe with false accusations.
“They printed posters in Anambra calling us gay partners,” he recalled. “That’s when I knew he endorses those rabid online attacks.”
“Information Warfare Worse Than Military Rule”
Sowore warned that the political atmosphere in Nigeria had become dangerously intolerant, comparing the media manipulation around Obi’s rise to tactics seen during the civil war and military rule.
“But there were guys who were against him (Obi) in those days who didn’t have the courage to come out again, because they were afraid of the backlash, and they did a fantastic job of scaring everybody,” he said.
He added that many of the youth leaders from EndSARS had been co-opted or silenced, naming popular activists and entertainers who allegedly supported the elite’s plan.
Sowore called for deeper political awareness and philosophical resistance.
During the interview, Sowore bared the emotional costs of his prolonged state-imposed exile—on his family, his marriage, and himself. He spoke not just as a political figure long vilified by Nigeria’s ruling class, but as a father, a husband, and a man haunted by a childhood vow made under siege.
Asked how his prolonged absence, compounded by the Nigerian government’s seizure of his passport between 2019 and 2024, impacted his family, Sowore was candid. “I don’t think there’s a replacement anywhere for the presence of a father or a mom,” he said. “You just hope that your family members are not collateral damage or damages to that mission.”
His children, especially, had grown into new people during his time away. His daughter had aged from 13 to 17, welcoming him back with cheerful indifference.
His son, more emotionally affected, struggled to reconnect at first. “He would look at me with some kind of surprise in his eyes and walk away,” Sowore recalled. Yet slowly, through shared rides, casual teasing, and “man-to-man” talks, the bonds began to reform.
“We started jiving again,” he said. “We engaged a few times and then started talking about serious things.”
Yet Sowore refused to sugarcoat his limitations. “I have no excuses,” he said, when asked if he felt his absence had robbed his children of the guidance he had wished for as a boy. While grateful for technology—video chats and long-distance conversations—he acknowledged that physical presence could never be truly substituted.
Sowore sees himself as a different kind of father—one who listens, who allows, who lets his children explore their identities.
“They could ask me to shut up, and I’ll be fine with it,” he said with a chuckle, contrasting that with his own upbringing where dissenting from a father’s wish was “an abomination.”
Reflecting on his marriage, Sowore did not shy away from self-critique.
“Sometimes I even think it’s unfair for people like me to get married,” he said solemnly. “Because I kind of knew that I came into this world to live a life of uncertainty. And marriage requires a lot of stability and certainty.”
His wife, whom he praised as “extraordinarily strong,” bore the brunt of his absences and the fear that he might not come back alive.
“Every morning she heard either directly or indirectly that the police had beaten me up or roughed me up,” he said. Her relief at his return was short-lived, replaced quickly with reality. “Your wife can tolerate you being on vacation for a long time,” he laughed, “but the moment you arrive, work starts.”
The couple and their kids tried to recalibrate during a vacation to Barbados, where Sowore had to learn the “ABC of fatherhood again.” He laughed at his kids’ response to his changed accent: “I want you to go and bring me water.” “You mean ‘water’?” they would ask, correcting him playfully.
When asked about the source of his rebellious spirit, Sowore traced it back to a defining childhood moment. At the age of ten, during Christmas week, a violent police raid on his village left a deep psychological scar.
“That was our happiest week as villagers,” he recalled. “And then the police came in… and raided the village at night. It was terrible.”
He described watching his father hide in the ceiling—“the man I thought was courageous”—while women and girls in the village, including his own cousin, were assaulted. “She never recovered,” he said. “She just died recently of stroke.”
That night changed him forever. “With where I was, I was 10 years old, and I swore by whatever was out there that if I made it out of here alive, I’d fight not to let this happen again,” Sowore said. “That was the promise of a 10-year-old.”
From a childhood vow in a raided village to decades of activism, arrests, and state-imposed exile, Sowore’s life has been anything but ordinary.
“I’m not trying to fit into anybody’s box,” he said. “Otherwise, I would have been born as ice cream to make people happy.”
