By Maroof Asudemade

There is a dangerous trend gaining currency in Oyo State politics. It is the unhealthy obsession with reducing gubernatorial aspirants to derogatory nicknames. Today, political conversations are no longer dominated by debates about education, healthcare, security, infrastructure, agriculture or the economy. They are drowned by a chorus of pejorative labels coined to entertain supporters and demonise opponents.

Every major aspirant now seems to have acquired one unflattering sobriquet or another. Their supporters wear these labels like badges of honour, while their opponents gleefully amplify them. Social media has become a marketplace of insults where wit is mistaken for wisdom and abuse is celebrated as political engagement. The growing culture of assigning disparaging sobriquets to gubernatorial aspirants in Oyo State should worry every citizen who genuinely desires good governance. Whether it is “Constituted Authority,” “Inarobo,” “Sen. Billboard,” “Radionic,” “Opebe,” or “Ereke ni ṣọ̀bú,” these labels have become substitutes for reasoned political engagement. This is unfortunate!

The tragedy is not that political supporters invent these names. Politics has always had its fair share of propaganda. The greater tragedy is that otherwise educated, discerning and respectable citizens have joined the bandwagon. They forward the insults, laugh at the memes, and repeat the nicknames with reckless enthusiasm, believing they are participating in democracy.

But they are not. They are merely contributing to the degradation of political discourse. A people who truly desire good governance do not evaluate aspirants through abusive labels. They interrogate their character, competence, experience, vision and capacity. They ask difficult questions. They demand practical solutions. They compare records. They challenge manifestoes. They insist on accountability.

When name-calling replaces scrutiny, democracy becomes entertainment. Elections become popularity contests. Governance becomes an afterthought.

One cannot but wonder whether we, the people of Oyo State, are genuinely prepared for the quality of leadership we constantly demand. We lament poor governance, yet we refuse to elevate our political conversations. We complain about the calibre of those who emerge as leaders, yet we reward noise instead of substance. It is impossible to harvest quality leadership from the soil of intellectual laziness.

No aspirant should be immune from criticism. Indeed, every one of them deserves rigorous public examination. But let that examination be based on facts, policies, antecedents, temperament and competence not childish sobriquets manufactured to inflame emotions and harvest applause. The future of over five million people is too serious to be reduced to slogans and insults.

The next governor of Oyo State will preside over the lives, the hopes and the aspirations of millions. Such an important decision cannot be based on who has the most derogatory nickname or whose supporters are the loudest on social media.

As the 2027 political season gathers momentum, Oyo people must make a choice. We can continue down the path of mockery, abuse and political infantilism, or we can restore dignity to our democratic conversation.

History will not remember who coined the funniest nickname. It will remember whether we chose competence over comedy, ideas over insults, and vision over vilification. The quality of our politics will ultimately determine the quality of our governance. The ball, therefore, is in our court.