Tinubu blows kisses from Paris, skips the Trump question again - Punch Newspapers

Who else noticed that President Tinubu and Emmanuel Macron wore matching spotted ties at their dinner in Paris the Thursday before last? If it was styled, it tells how far the choreography of their bromance has come. If it was unstyled, purely coincidental, it tells you something more interesting still; that the two men have simply spent enough time in each other’s company to begin dressing alike, the way close friends or couples who have been together for a while start finishing each other’s sentences. Either way, it was the latest entry in what has become a running friendship that has had implications for Tinubu over the past three-plus years of his presidency. Tinubu’s first international engagement as president was in June 2023, in France, where he attended the Summit for a New Global Financing Pact hosted by President Macron at Palais Brongniart. Both men held talks on the sidelines of that summit. Macron hosted Tinubu and the First Lady for a grand three-day state visit in November 2024. On September 10, 2025, the two leaders met over lunch in Paris to “review key areas of cooperation” and agreed to deepen the partnership. In a phone call to Tinubu last December, Macron pledged deeper security cooperation against terrorism in the North. At his Sallah reception in Lagos this March, Tinubu credited Macron’s partnership with yielding “concrete security dividends.”See more Punch stories on Google.Add Punch on Google At a Sallah reception with Governors in March, the President said he had “a lengthy discussion” with Macron, during which France agreed to collaborate on equipment and support for Nigeria’s counter-terrorism fight. In May, Tinubu returned to Paris as the first stop on his Nairobi–Kigali tour, where Macron co-chaired the Africa-France Summit. This September, both men had dinner at the Élysée, where they exchanged warm words about their “enduring relationship.” At some point, a typical Nigerian watching this would ask the question every African mother asks when her child keeps visiting the same friend’s house: “Can’t this friend come to your house too? Why is it always you going to meet them?” It is a fair question my mother asked me a long time ago, when I started spending so much time at a friend’s place. Carried away by the company I was enjoying, I’d never thought about why they never visited me. Tinubu has visited Paris at least 13 times now and has spent over two months there cumulatively. Within 18 months in office, he’d visited six times, and I’m not the only one counting. Junta leader of Niger Republic General Abdourahamane Tchiani was watching even more closely. And when the time was ripe, he easily blamed his country’s woes on Tinubu, whom he accused of colluding with France to destabilise his regime. Beneficiaries of conditional cash transfer not on social media — Yilwatda Nation counting on you, Tinubu tells new military officers 2027: Osun APC rallies electorate for candidates, says current hardship temporary Though the Federal Government, the Presidency, and the National Security Adviser strongly denied the claim, it sounded believable enough to sway many Nigerians, thanks to the optics of the past 18 months. Once again, Tinubu handed his critics the raw material to do it again. A Nigerian president who keeps crossing the ocean to dine with the French president, while the same French president has shown no equivalent urgency to cross it back. Things got to a head last week when three factors converged in a way that even the President’s most vocal defenders were struggling to do their job. For one, the President and his deputy, Vice President Kashim Shettima, were both outside Nigeria at the same time. Tinubu had just extended his stay in Paris while he asked Shettima to lead Nigeria’s delegation to the 81st UN General Assembly in New York. Second, Tinubu, who departed on August 30 for what was billed as a three-week working holiday, extended that stay by several more days without any public confirmation that he had transmitted the written declaration that Section 145 of the 1999 Constitution requires whenever a President is to be absent or “unable to discharge his functions”. Of course, the argument here was that the President is very much active while he is away. The third, and most telling, is how Macron, Tinubu’s host, packed his bags and left Paris for New York to attend the UN General Assembly himself, the same assembly Tinubu has, for three consecutive years now, delegated to Shettima. Macron, in effect, showed his guest where the spare key was, how to feed the dogs and how to turn on the lawn sprinkler, and departed for his national assignment as President. Atiku’s camp and a US lobbying firm, Tinubu’s spokesman, Mr Bayo Onanuga, complained and made “irresponsible insinuations” about these occurrences. I will not pretend to know the President’s calculus with certainty. But consider that he would have been in New York and would have met US President Donald Trump in person for the first time. Having found his administration in a delicate situation last October when Trump threatened an invasion due to a Christian Genocide, many thought the UNGA would be the perfect platform for Tinubu to face the US President and other world leaders to “clear the air.” The First Lady’s appearance at the White House prayer breakfast in February and several other signals that followed were believed to be the harbinger of the big September meeting. But that was not to be. In my earlier pieces, I explored what I argued was the hide-and-seek relationship between the two men. My observations have been further proven as Tinubu defied all earlier arrangements. As world leaders argued away in New York, Tinubu holidayed in Paris. From that restful atmosphere in the city of love, he penned the love letter with which he serenaded his wife on her 66th birthday. A love-struck Tinubu wrote, “I call you my truest friend and confidante because you speak the truth plainly, even on the days I would rather not hear it.” He thanked her for staying calm beside him in uncertain seasons, for sensing what he needed before he asked. Stephen Angbulu With three years of experience, Stephen, The PUNCH correspondent, has been covering Nigeria’s presidency, politics, security, immigration and trafficking in persons

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