By Otunba Segun Sowunmi
Amachree’s write-up collapses under the weight of its own contradictions, exaggerations, and ironically the same divisive instincts it claims to condemn.
First, let’s deal with the most offensive and intellectually lazy premise: that Gilbert Chagoury is somehow “less Nigerian” and therefore an easier target for outrage. That is not just wrong it is dangerous.
Gilbert Chagoury is Nigerian by law, by investment, and by decades of continuous engagement with this country. He has lived, built, employed, paid taxes, and taken risks in Nigeria for over half a century. Many of the loudest critics, including diaspora commentators writing from comfortable homes abroad, cannot claim that level of sustained commitment. You do not get to emotionally exit a country and then question the legitimacy of those who stayed and built within it.
If contribution is the metric, then let’s be honest: he has contributed more to Nigeria’s physical and economic landscape than many who dominate online outrage cycles. That is not sentiment it is measurable reality.
Second, this attempt to reduce complex infrastructure procurement into a simplistic “$13 billion gift to one man” narrative is, at best, distortion and, at worst, deliberate misinformation. Large-scale infrastructure projects coastal highways, port rehabilitation, shoreline protection are not social media slogans. They involve engineering, financing structures, sovereign guarantees, and execution risk at a level most commentators do not even attempt to understand.
If there are legitimate concerns, then present them properly:
• Where is the documented breach of procurement law?
• Which statutory provisions were violated?
• What evidence exists beyond assertion?
Anything less is noise.
Third, the fixation on past legal issues without context, without acknowledging legal closure or evolution betrays selective outrage. If Nigerian law disqualifies an individual from contracts or honours, cite it. If not, then what we are seeing is not accountability it is opportunistic character assassination.
Fourth, the diaspora sermonizing is deeply ironic. Distance does not automatically confer clarity. Writing from Stockholm, London, or Houston does not substitute for operational understanding of Nigeria’s infrastructure ecosystem. Perspective is useful but detachment can breed oversimplification.
Now, to the hypocrisy at the heart of this piece: it condemns tribalism while replacing it with something equally toxic xenophobic insinuation. Swap “tribe” for “foreigner,” and suddenly it is acceptable outrage? That is not reform. That is prejudice in a different costume.
Nigeria’s challenge is institutional not ethnic, not foreign:
• weak procurement enforcement
• elite capture across all divides
• opacity in contract structuring
• weak accountability mechanisms
Blaming one businessman foreign-born or otherwise does not fix systemic failure.
And since facts matter, let us speak concretely. Look at Eko Atlantic, the stabilization of Victoria Island against Atlantic encroachment, and the coastal engineering behind the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway. These are not abstract claims they are visible, technical interventions that have reshaped Nigeria’s coastline and protected economic assets. You may debate contracts, but you cannot erase execution.
Frankly, one has to look at these achievements and wonder how anyone reduces such complexity to a lazy narrative of theft without proof.
At this point, enough is enough. I strongly encourage the Chagoury Group to consider legal action against defamatory claims and put this embarrassing cycle of uninformed agitation to rest. Public discourse must carry consequences when it abandons facts for sensationalism.
And to you, Gilbert Chagoury, GCON: thank you for demonstrating what long-term commitment to Nigeria looks like. You have lived the Nigerian Dream in a way many only theorize about.
A grateful nation and its more discerning citizens say: Ese. Daalu. Nagode. Thank you.
Otunba Segun Showunmi
The Alternative.
