Nigeria is drifting through a storm it barely understands. Empires are reshaping the future with missiles and sanctions while we argue about subsidies, ethnicity, and who takes over the Government House in 2027. We do not see that the chessboard has already moved. We do not see that sovereignty is being redrawn not by treaties but by airstrikes. The old rules are gone. The world has entered the age of raw power, and Africa is the soft underbelly of the planet.
While Nigerians quarrel about zoning, restructuring and the price of fuel, the United States has begun to operate like a power that answers only to itself. It no longer hides behind multilateral committees or diplomatic protocol. It moves directly. Venezuela felt it first. Iran is already in the cross hairs. China and Russia are being tested in real time. And once you normalize a doctrine of intervention without global consent, Africa becomes the next theater. Nigeria sits on oil, gas, uranium, gold, lithium and the largest demographic pool on the continent. We are not spectators. We are bait.
The old multilateral order was built in the aftermath of World War Two, and for decades America dominated it. Now Washington is abandoning the very institutions it once created. It has already walked away from UNESCO, turned its back on the World Health Organization, exited human rights councils, dismissed climate agreements and treated international law as optional. The justification is always the same. These bodies are bloated, mismanaged, hostile to American prosperity and no longer serve US national interests.
But here lies the paradox. When you withdraw from the system you built, you teach the world to stop needing you. Europe is terrified, but it cannot admit it publicly. It thought the threat was Russia. It now realizes that if America can bomb Venezuela and offer to seize Greenland in the name of national security, then NATO guarantees are only as strong as the mood of a future White House occupant.
Russia saw the Venezuelan strikes as an attack not only on a partner but on the principle of sovereignty itself. China read it as a signal that investment and diplomatic recognition no longer protect you from regime change. India pretended to be neutral, because it understands that no one can survive this century by picking one master. The smart nations are hedging. The nervous nations are praying. The confused nations are debating irrelevant domestic scandals on social media while their destiny is being negotiated abroad.
And then there is BRICS. The United States once thought BRICS was a talk shop. Now it sees it as an escape hatch for nations tired of dollar debt, sanctions and geopolitical obedience. Washington tolerated BRICS until it began to expand. When Venezuela, Iran and Saudi Arabia flirted with joining, it suddenly became a national security threat. The message was simple. You can pursue reform within the global order but you cannot build an alternative to it. That is the red line.
The bigger irony is that Americas pivot away from diplomacy may accelerate the very multipolarity it fears. When a superpower abandons rules, the rest of the world learns to play without referees. The collapse of the UN system will not kill global politics. It will simply relocate it. Beijing, Moscow, New Delhi, Riyadh, Brasilia, and even Pretoria are already writing new operating manuals for global commerce and security. The next decade will not be defined by treaties. It will be defined by corridors, pipelines, alternative payment systems, deep tech alliances and military industrial partnerships.
This is why 2027 matters for Nigeria. Elections used to be local affairs. Now they are components of global strategy. Whoever occupies Aso Rock after 2027 will determine whether Nigeria joins the multipolar era as a sovereign actor, or as a pawn in someone elses expansion. If Nigeria leans West without reform, we become Libya. If we lean East without strategy, we become Sri Lanka. If we refuse to choose at all, we become Ukraine. Survival requires non alignment with teeth, economic coherence, and military capacity. Without these, all debates are academic.
Nigeria has wasted decades believing that oil alone grants geopolitical immunity. It does not. Oil without capacity is a curse. Oil without deterrence is an invitation. Oil without diplomacy is a death sentence. The United States has already demonstrated that it can remove governments, collapse currencies, sanction whole populations and choke infrastructure without firing a single bullet. Venezuela is a lesson in slow strangulation. Iran is a lesson in resilience. Russia is a lesson in retaliation. China is a lesson in patience. The question is simple. What lesson is Nigeria prepared to learn.
The closing tragedy is that Nigeria does not see itself as a battleground. It still sees itself as a democracy in transition. But to the world, Nigeria is a commodity hub with weak institutions, corrupt elites, a frustrated youth bulge, fragmented security networks and a broken political class that could be bought, pressured or replaced if necessary. That is a dangerous position to occupy in a century defined by resource wars and spheres of influence.
If Nigeria does not rapidly rethink its alliance architecture, its military doctrine, its diplomatic posture, and its economic sovereignty, the redrawing of Africa will not be negotiated in Addis Ababa or Abuja. It will be decided in Washington, Beijing, and Riyadh. And by then, zoning, ethnicity, party primaries and the comedy of our national politics will no longer matter. The map never asks for permission before it changes.
This is the new world. The empire no longer negotiates. The multipolar bloc no longer hides. The continent no longer has the luxury of innocence. Africa must choose alignment, not sentiment. Nigeria must choose sovereignty, not illusion. And 2027 may be the last window before that choice is made for us.
By Hon. Chima Nnadi-Oforgu
Duruebube Uzii na Abosi
OBLONG MEDIA UNLIMITED 
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