Sowore and His Politics of Perpetual Protest

By Olufemi Shaka lives in Ogun State.

By any measure, activism and opposition politics remains an integral part of a nation’s political system to help checkmate the excesses of the sitting government and act as feedback mechanism on their plans and policies. However, what seem to be genuine calls of transformation through these media, has increasingly become a tool for manipulation and inciting the public against the government. A key figure driving this trend of misguided activism, is the person of Omoyele Sowere. Yes, I said it! At what point would we, as Nigerians begin to call things as they were (if I may be allowed to borrow one of the phrases by former President Good luck Ebele Jonathan). His consistent and senseless swipes at the government now sounds like a broken record.
The recent run-ins between Sowore and the DSS only buttress my point about the emblematic nature of his antagonism. Let’s first examine the impasse objectively: there is nothing wrong with a sitting president traveling abroad to market his country as corruption-free in a bid to attract foreign direct investment. Such efforts can create jobs and open opportunities that benefit citizens in the long run. Or is Sowore disillusioned about this fact as well? Does he believe poverty and insecurity are absent in Western societies? How often do we see them branding their countries as destitute or corrupt?
While much of the public portrays Sowore as a heroic victim of state repression, an alternative angle deserves equal attention: has his activism always been driven by genuine civic duty, or has it often functioned as a stage for personal ambition and branding? This question is not malicious, it is rooted in Sowore’s trajectory. From campus protests in the early 1990s, to founding the combative online platform Sahara Reporters in the mid-2000s, to eventually launching his own political party, his career has been consistently defined by confrontation with power. Yet that very consistency raises deeper questions: who truly funds Sowore, and what are the real motives behind his activism? When the layers are peeled back, his dissent often resembles a scripted performance rather than authentic conviction.
From Campus Radical to Media Maverick
Sowore’s roots trace back to student unionism at the University of Lagos, where he gained prominence as a radical student leader during the turbulent late 1980s and early 1990s. Those were years of military rule marked by repression, experiences that sharpened his anti-establishment posture. He later carried that posture into the founding of Sahara Reporters, the New York-based citizen journalism platform that published leaks, exposed corruption, and attacked Nigeria’s political elite. By operating outside Nigerian censorship, Sowore positioned Sahara Reporters as a megaphone for dissent. It won him a loyal following among young Nigerians at home and abroad, laying the groundwork for the next phase of his career.
This is even as David Hundeyin, among others, has linked Sahara Reporters to over $1.2 million in funding from U.S.-affiliated organizations such as the Ford Foundation and often rumoured to be fronts for Western intelligence (CIA). If true, the question arises: is Sowore running a subversive cell? Or is he beholden to the very hands that bankroll his activism? Far from championing revolution, his posture appears more about steering the public into fruitless agitation, serving foreign interests at the expense of Nigeria’s development.
The Political Pivot
By 2018, Sowore had transitioned from activist-publisher to party politician. He launched the African Action Congress (AAC) and contested the 2019 presidential election. Though he performed poorly at the polls, the campaign firmly established his political ambition. This shift matters for one key reason: once an activist becomes a party leader, the incentives inevitably change. Protest and mobilization no longer serve purely civic purposes, they also become tools for building personal political capital. It is in this light that his much-publicized clashes with the DSS take on another layer of meaning.
In 2019, only months after the election, Sowore spearheaded the REVOLUTION NOW movement, calling for nationwide protests. He argued that Nigeria required a mass uprising to dislodge what he described as a corrupt and incompetent political order. Unsurprisingly, security agencies treated Revolution Now as a direct threat to constitutional order. Sowore was arrested and charged with treasonable felony. His arrest sparked both national and international outrage, with human rights groups condemning the government for repressing dissent. Yet when DSS operatives re-arrested him in a dramatic courtroom scene later that year, the optics were disastrous for the state: it looked as though Nigeria was criminalizing activism itself.
When you think about it, here is the nuance which is often lost in the simplified activist versus dictatorship narrative. Nobody even thought for a second that SOWORE was simply a disgruntled politician who had just lost at the polls and, and instead of going through proper channels decided to become a protest convener, instigating young followers to hit the streets. A clear attempt to achieve on the street what he could not achieve at the polls
Mobilizing the Youth, Bearing the Risk
One of Sowore’s greatest strengths is his ability to connect with young Nigerians, many of whom are less familiar with the entrenched dynamics of traditional politics. By mastering the language of social media, he turns hashtags into real-world mobilization. But does he truly have the interests of Nigerian youth at heart?
When crowds of young people poured into the streets under the banner, confrontation with security agencies was inevitable. Arrests were made, clashes erupted, and ordinary Nigerians bore the consequences. Who shoulders responsibility when young people are exposed to predictable harm? Was the endgame truly reform, or was it to throw himself back to the limelight after electoral loss?
True activism must be judged not only by the passion it inspires but also by the consequences it produces. The cost of broken bones, detentions, and disrupted livelihoods cannot be dismissed as mere collateral damage in one man’s political theatre. Speaking of disrupted livelihoods, while SOWORE is busy mobilizing young Nigerians to fight his battles, his son, Komi Sowore, reportedly attends Dwight-Englewood School in New Jersey, where tuition costs over $54,000 per term (about ₦85 million) and $163,000 (₦250 million) annually. Are these funds the fruits of alleged blackmail campaigns tied to his brand of activism?
Unlike contemporaries such as Peter Obi, who has funded scholarships and youth foundations, Sowore is yet to be linked with supporting young Nigerians in similar ways. Instead, he appears more often in interviews, castigating ordinary citizens for celebrating Hilda Baci’s record-breaking pot of jollof rice, while urging them to rise against the government. What tangible contribution has he made beyond instigating unrest?
Let’s be clear: activism is vital in every democracy. Governments must be held accountable, and dissent remains the lifeblood of freedom. Nigeria’s democratic journey has been shaped by those who refused to be silenced. Such activism deserves respect. But we must also call out figures like Sowore for what they are: opportunists who toggle between activism and politics, between journalism and protest, whichever role keeps them in the spotlight and at odds with authority. Today, he is an activist; tomorrow, a presidential aspirant; the next day, a publisher. Always, he is hunting for a new front from which to confront power.
In the end, democracy is not sustained by endless confrontation for its own sake, but by genuine accountability on all sides. Sowore’s story should reminds us that even those who claim the activist mantle must themselves be held to account.