Free Speech Is Not License for Anarchy. By Olaitan Adesina
Free Speech Is Not License for Anarchy.
By Olaitan Adesina
I have read several elegantly written and legally textured articles demanding or appealing for leniency from the Honourable Minister for the Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo in the matter of Emorioloye Owolemi, the self-acclaimed Director General of Asiwaju Media Team, an organization which parades itself as a campaign support group for the reemergence of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu as President of Nigeria in 2027. It is instructive to note that in the last six months, Emorioloye and his AMT have expended more time and effort on defaming Tunji-Ojo than they have spent actually campaigning for Tinubu. Beneath the polished constitutional vocabulary and passionate conviction of the appeals for mercy and forgiveness lies a troubling proposition: that the state must demonstrate its strength through leniency toward an individual who has shown sustained contempt for both institutional clarification and lawful restraint.
Let us begin where we agree. Section 39 of the Constitution protects freedom of expression. Public officials must endure scrutiny. Citizens must be able to question power without fear. Democracy demands it.
But democracy also demands responsibility.
The controversy surrounding the NYSC certificate of the Honourable Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, was not shut down by intimidation. It was addressed by competent statutory authorities. The National Youth Service Corps formally affirmed the authenticity of the Minister’s credentials. That affirmation carries a presumption of regularity under law. If such institutional declarations can simply be dismissed because one private citizen insists otherwise, then we are no longer practicing constitutional democracy. We are indulging performative dissent.
What those asking for leniency delicately skirt is this: upon his earlier arrest and subsequent release by the Department of State Services, Mr. Emorioloye Owolemi did not retreat into reflection. He doubled down. Yes, he tactically paused the cyberstalking. But he reaffirmed the same allegations without presenting new evidence capable of displacing institutional verification.
That is not activism. That is obstinacy elevated to ideology.
There is a growing culture in our civic space best captured by the phrase “Leave am for God.” A culture where offence is allowed to slide without repercussion, where justice is spiritualized, and accountability is postponed to divine arbitration. God, with due reverence, has more consequential matters to supervise than mediating interpersonal political vendettas among mortals armed with data bundles and a smattering of the English language.
When a citizen repeatedly publishes allegations after competent institutions have spoken, the matter ceases to be a constitutional romance about free speech. It becomes a question of criminal defamation and cyberstalking under extant laws. Litigation in such circumstances is not vindictiveness. It is due process. It is the civilized alternative to utter chaos.
People argue that power, when secure, need not be heavy-handed. True. But power, when mocked without consequence, erodes. The law does not exist merely to validate the innocent; it exists to deter the reckless. Consequence is not cruelty. It serves to instruct and instill discipline.
If every institutional finding can be neutralized by persistent online repetition, then no public officer will ever be vindicated in practice, regardless of evidence. The digital mob will simply declare appeal over facts. That is not democratic vibrancy. It is reputational insurgency.
This is not about silencing dissent. It is about drawing the line between inquiry and injury, skepticism and sabotage, and between free speech and calculated harm.
Mercy is noble. But deterrence is necessary. There must be consequences for Owolemi’s actions, not because the Minister is powerful, but because the law must remain powerful. Without consequence, we normalize defamatory activism. We incentivize performative outrage. And we reduce our institutions to background noise in a theatre of endless accusation.
Democracy is not strengthened by indulgence toward those who ignore institutional validation. It is strengthened when rights are balanced with responsibility, and when falsehood, once established as such, meets lawful correction.
The issue before us is simple: Can a citizen continue to recycle unsubstantiated allegations after statutory bodies have spoken, and claim constitutional immunity?
If the answer is yes, then institutional authority is ornamental. If the answer is no, then due process must be allowed to run its course.
Freedom must be protected. But freedom without consequence is not liberty. It is anarchy.
_Olaitan Adesina is a poet and author of Agidigbo: Soliloquy in Verse. He writes from Akure._
