Olu Allen
There is a question Nigerians should be allowed to ask without being accused of politics: why is President Bola Ahmed Tinubu increasingly absent from some of the occasions on which the Nigerian state is expected to be represented at the highest level?
The question is no longer about one trip.
In 2024, Tinubu did not personally attend the 79th United Nations General Assembly in New York; Vice-President Kashim Shettima represented him.
In 2025, Shettima again represented the President at the 80th UNGA. And in 2026, for the third consecutive year, Shettima led Nigeria’s delegation to the 81st General Assembly.
There is nothing constitutionally unusual about a president delegating an assignment to his vice-president.
The Vice-President is constitutionally empowered to act on the President’s behalf in appropriate circumstances.
But three consecutive absences from the annual gathering of world leaders are enough to make the pattern itself worthy of scrutiny.
And the question becomes even more interesting when placed alongside another development: the repeated disappearance of the traditional Independence Day military parade from the national programme.
In 2025, the parade was cancelled. In 2026, the federal government announced a low-key 66th Independence anniversary programme featuring religious services, a public lecture and the President’s nationwide broadcast, but no traditional military parade.
None of these decisions, individually, proves wrongdoing.
Together, however, they raise a legitimate question about presidential presence, national symbolism and the explanations offered to Nigerians.
The “domestic priorities” explanation
When Tinubu skipped the 79th UNGA in 2024, the Presidency said he would remain in Nigeria to attend to domestic matters, including the response to flooding and other pressing issues.
In 2026, the explanation was again framed around domestic priorities, particularly the economy and security.
A presidential aide defended the decision by arguing that Nigeria’s international engagement extends beyond the UN and that the country can advance its interests through other channels.
That is a perfectly legitimate argument to make.
But it does not end the conversation.
The difficulty is that Tinubu’s 2026 UNGA absence occurred while he was on an extended working vacation in Europe.
The State House confirmed that he spent time in London and Paris and, while in Paris, had a private dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron at the Élysée Palace.
This creates an obvious question: if the President’s schedule permitted international travel and high-level diplomatic engagement in Paris, what specifically prevented his participation in the UNGA in New York?
That question does not assume that he was obliged to attend.
It asks only that the government explain the distinction.
If the answer is that the President considered the UNGA less important than the engagements he undertook in Europe, Nigerians are entitled to know that.
If the answer is that his working vacation had already been scheduled and could not reasonably be altered, Nigerians are entitled to know that too.
But “domestic priorities” becomes an unsatisfying explanation when the President is simultaneously outside Nigeria.
The issue, therefore, is not whether Tinubu was legally entitled to skip UNGA.
It is whether the public has been given a sufficiently precise explanation for why he chose to do so.
The seat that was waiting in New York
The controversy became more striking because Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Jimoh Ibrahim, had publicly discussed securing a prominent position for Nigeria at the 81st UNGA.
Ibrahim later said Nigeria had been assigned the sixth seat in the front row and defended the diplomatic significance of that positioning.
He also explained that the American president did not remain in his designated seat for the session as expected.
Former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar seized on the issue, saying: “The seat was secured, but the President disappeared.”
Atiku also questioned reports that the administration had spent up to $9 million on American lobbyists, asking why Nigeria would spend millions lobbying Washington while the President repeatedly stayed away from the UN gathering in New York.
The $9 million figure should be treated as a reported allegation rather than an established fact unless the administration or documentary evidence provides a definitive accounting.
But the underlying question deserves attention regardless:
What does Nigeria gain when it invests heavily in diplomatic and lobbying relationships but its President repeatedly chooses not to appear personally at the world’s biggest annual diplomatic gathering?
There may be a perfectly defensible answer.
The government should give it.
The Independence Day question
The Independence Day parade presents a different but related issue.
The 2025 cancellation initially generated speculation because it coincided with the arrest of military officers over what later became a confirmed investigation into an alleged plot to overthrow the government.
But it is important to distinguish what was alleged from what was officially established.
At the time, the Defence Headquarters explicitly denied that the parade cancellation was connected to any coup attempt. It said the parade was cancelled to allow Tinubu to attend a strategic bilateral meeting outside the country and to enable the Armed Forces to maintain momentum in their operations against terrorism, insurgency and banditry.
That was the government’s official explanation.
Then, in January 2026, the Defence Headquarters confirmed that there had indeed been a coup plot against the Tinubu administration and that officers would face trial.
The later confirmation does not, by itself, establish that the parade was cancelled because of the coup plot.
But it does make the chronology more consequential.
And now, in 2026, the traditional military parade has not returned.
The federal government’s 66th Independence programme was described as low-key and included a public lecture, religious services and a presidential broadcast. The published program did not include the traditional military parade.
That leaves Nigerians with another reasonable question:
Why has the military parade disappeared from the national Independence Day programme for two consecutive years?
If the answer is security, say so.
If the answer is cost, say so.
If the answer is a deliberate change in how the government wants Independence Day commemorated, say so.
But citizens should not have to reconstruct the reasoning from fragments of official statements and media reports.
Does presidential absence matter?
There is a temptation to dismiss all of this by saying: “The Vice-President represented Nigeria.”
That is true.
Shettima has not merely shown up ceremonially. At the 81st UNGA, he delivered Nigeria’s national statement and participated in high-level engagements on issues including UN reform, security, development finance, climate action and Africa’s representation in global institutions.
Nigeria therefore did not disappear from the UN because Tinubu was absent.
But representation and presidential presence are not necessarily the same thing.
A president attending personally has access to other heads of government, private diplomatic conversations, bilateral meetings and opportunities that come with the office itself.
At the 81st UNGA, Nigeria was actively pursuing major diplomatic objectives, including reform of the international financial architecture and stronger African representation in the UN Security Council.
The question is not whether the Vice-President can represent Nigeria.
He clearly can.
The question is whether Nigeria should expect its President to personally participate in some of the world’s most consequential diplomatic gatherings, and, if not, what principle determines when he attends and when he delegates.
That principle has not been clearly explained to the public.
Leadership is also about presence
There is a deeper issue here.
Presidential leadership is not only about policies signed, meetings held or speeches delivered. It is also about national symbolism.
The Independence Day parade is one of those symbols.
So is a Nigerian President standing before the international community at the United Nations.
These events communicate something beyond the immediate business being conducted.
They tell citizens and the international community where the Nigerian state places its attention.
Tinubu personally attended the 78th UNGA in 2023. Since then, however, Shettima has represented him at the next three sessions.
At the same time, a traditional symbol of Nigeria’s Independence Day celebrations has disappeared for two consecutive years.
Perhaps there is a perfectly coherent strategic explanation for both developments.
If so, the government should make that explanation clearly and publicly.
Because absence itself is not necessarily the problem.
Unexplained absence is.
The question Nigerians should keep asking
This should not become another contest between supporters and opponents of Tinubu.
Supporters are entitled to defend the President’s decisions. Critics are entitled to question them. Neither side should substitute political loyalty for evidence.
The President may have sound reasons for delegating the UNGA appearances.
The government may have sound reasons for changing the Independence Day programme.
But Nigerians should not be required to guess those reasons.
Three consecutive UNGA absences are now a fact.
Two consecutive years without the traditional Independence Day military parade are also a fact.
The President’s 2026 European working vacation and his private dinner with Macron are documented.
The government’s stated explanations are also documented.
The legitimate task for journalists and citizens is therefore not to invent a hidden motive.
It is to ask the government to connect the dots.
Why these three consecutive UNGA absences?
Why the disappearance of the Independence Day military parade?
What criteria determine when presidential presence is considered necessary and when delegation is sufficient?
And, perhaps most importantly, is there a deliberate new doctrine of presidential representation that Nigerians have simply not been told about?
These are not hostile questions.
They are democratic questions.
A government that believes its decisions are defensible should not fear explaining them.
Nigeria does not need a President who is physically present at every ceremony.
But Nigerians deserve to understand why their President is present at some international engagements and absent from others, and why some national traditions disappear without a clear explanation.
The issue is not the seat in New York.
It is the confidence that Nigerians have in knowing why their President chose not to occupy it.
Allen writes on public affairs, governance and society.
