Tinubu in Türkiye: Was it a stumble or a fall? The simple answer is: what does it matter?
By Ikechukwu Amaechi
When President Bola Tinubu stumbled and fell on Tuesday as he walked alongside the President of the Republic of Türkiye, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, during a welcome ceremony in Ankara, his spin doctors went into overdrive in explaining away the incident. That was expected. But in doing so, they lied.
His Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, said “the president stepped on a metal on the floor, which made him lose his balance.” Of course, the possibility of a metal object on the carpet was zilch. Neither was the fall the consequence of a poorly laid blue carpet at the venue as was later claimed. But that wasn’t the only lie. Onanuga further said: “This is not a big deal, except for those who want to make mischief out of a fleeting incident. It was a mere stumble, thank God, not a fall.” It was not a mere stumble. A video posted on X by Turkish digital news platform, Nefes Gazetesi, shows Tinubu stumbling before falling.
If there was anything to be thankful for, it is the fact that “no injury was recorded, and the President went on to participate fully in the rest of the scheduled programme” as Sunday Dare, another Tinubu aide, noted. But that fact does not give him a clean bill of health. Tinubu looked too puffed up and disoriented at times, and his movement was wobbly. There was a moment during the reception when his host adjusted his body to properly face the band playing the national anthem and at some point, the 71-year-old Erdogan could be seen holding his hand.
To be sure, incidents of world leaders falling or stumbling while performing official duties abound. Former U.S. President Joe Biden had multiple public stumbles, most notably tripping three times while ascending the stairs to Air Force One in March 2021 and falling on stage during a U.S. Air Force Academy graduation ceremony in 2023. His predecessor, Barack Obama, also stumbled while disembarking Air Force One at Andrews Air Force Base in 2015. In 2004, then Cuban President, Fidel Castro, fell off a stage after a speech in Santa Clara, resulting in a broken knee and arm. President Vladimir Putin, a fitness wonk, fell on his back after tripping during a 2019 victory lap in a hockey game. The list is endless. Even Tinubu slipped and fell while boarding a parade vehicle at Eagle Square in June 2024.
While such incidents remind us of the human vulnerability that exists even at the highest levels of power, they nevertheless attract significant media attention and often fuel debates regarding a leader’s physical fitness. It comes with the job and Tinubu’s fall cannot be different. So, those raising issues over his state of health don’t necessarily want him dead.
The important debate, though, is whether this presidential globetrotting is necessary. Of course, Tinubu’s acolytes will answer in the affirmative. Onanuga said this extant visit was meant to strengthen the “existing cordial relations between the two countries” and explore further areas of cooperation in security, education, social development, innovation, and aviation.
But all protestations to the contrary by regime officials notwithstanding, nothing tangible has come out of Tinubu’s junkets since his presidency ensued almost three years ago. As at October 2025, he had embarked on 46 trips abroad, spending a total of 192 days outside the country. In 2023, he travelled 13 times, followed by 19 trips in 2024. When he embarked on what Onanuga described as a 10-day working vacation on September 5, 2025, his 15th international trip in 2025 shortly after returning from a trip to Japan and Brazil, many Nigerians gave him the sobriquet “visiting president.” In order to mask the real purpose of most of these junkets, which is medical tourism, the presidency started using Europe as destination without return dates. But, while he delights in his foreign trips, he artfully dodges visiting Nigerian states even in times of national tragedy.
But does Nigeria need Tinubu’s global junkets for an economic reset back home? Again, his devotees answer in the affirmative. For instance, they crow that Nigeria and Türkiye are targeting $5 billion trade volume. Onanuga, who revealed details of the nine agreements signed on Tuesday, quoted President Erdogan as saying that the establishment of a joint economy and trade committee would create opportunities for expanding Turkish investments in Nigeria.
Already, the Tinubu orchestra is ululating but the devil is in the implementation and there is nothing to show that the Türkiye salsa will be a different kind of ballet. When Tinubu attended the G20 Summit in India in August 2023, he claimed to have secured the commitments of Indian businessmen to make a combined $14 billion investment in Nigeria. Our eardrums were almost pierced by his vuvuzelas. In fact, in his October 1, 2024 independence anniversary broadcast, he announced that within the first 16 months of his administration, his government had attracted over $30 billion in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). At the 2024 G20 summit in Brazil, he announced a $2.5 billion investment deal signed by Brazilian agribusiness giant JBS to strengthen sustainable supply chains, an initiative which Onanuga crowed would enhance local food production and generate new job opportunities, particularly for Nigerian youths. That is yet to materialise.
On June 3, 2025, the presidency upped the economic rhetoric ante, claiming that the president’s trips had attracted over $50 billion in FDI to the country. Giving a mid-term assessment of Tinubu’s foreign policy achievements, his Senior Special Assistant on Foreign Affairs and International Relations, Ambassador Sola Enikanolaye, cited ‘commitments’ from multinationals such as Sunil Bharti, ExxonMobil, TotalEnergies, Indorama, Jindal Steel, Coca-Cola, Apple, Maersk, Arise, Shell, Afreximbank, etc. as proof. To flaunt such ‘commitments’ as evidence of FDI inflows is to be economical with the truth because celebrating mere announcements or promissory notes by multinationals or even foreign leaders as actual inflows of FDI by those who ought to know better is just sheer propaganda.
Truth be told, not even a fraction of these investment promises that the Tinubu administration wants Nigerians to celebrate has come in. And they won’t if things remain the way they are now in Nigeria for the simple reason that capital is a coward and investment funds will always flee from instability and high-risk environments. Nigeria is not only unstable but also a high risk environment. And in such environments, what thrives is Foreign Portfolio Investment (FPI) – hot money – that consists of passive, short-term holdings of financial assets, often speculative, unlike FDIs that involve physical assets and tangible investments.
Yet, government officials insist that Tinubu’s globetrotting is pivotal to national development. It is not. And drawing a moral equivalence between his foreign junkets and President Obasanjo’s is sheer fallacy. Not even Buhari’s junkets are on the same odious pedestal. Obasanjo’s diplomatic shuttles were borne out of necessity and understandable. When he assumed office on May 29, 1999, Nigeria was a pariah nation. So, his frequent trips were aimed at bringing Nigeria back from the cold. He succeeded. Nigeria is no longer a pariah in the comity of nations. Buhari’s junkets conversely were for the sole reason of medical tourism and no Nigerian was left in doubt. If Tinubu is following in Buhari’s lockstep, then, he should be man enough to say so.
President Tinubu should stay back home and fix Nigeria for two reasons. First is enlightened self-interest. His fragile health can no longer carry him through such rigorous diplomatic exertions. He should stop lying to himself. Secondly, Nigeria is where the problem is. Not Japan, UAE, Brazil, India or Türkiye. If he secures the country, the polity will stabilize and FDIs will flow in.
And he can do it if he puts his mind to it. After all, was that not why he was elected president? But if he cannot, he may well heed his own advice to President Goodluck Jonathan – quit! Rather than continue chasing shadows in the name of governance, Tinubu should hearken to the advice of Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney, at the 2026 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland when he said: “We have… the capacity to stop pretending, to name reality, to build our strength at home and to act together.” President Tinubu should learn the delicate art of building coalitions that work on multilateral paradigm. That is the only way Nigeria will be at the table, rather than on the menu of global power hegemons.
But most importantly, he must, earnestly, develop the capacity to stop pretending that all is well with Nigeria. No serious investor will come with his hard earned capital to a country with seriously compromised territorial integrity, a country that is contesting its sovereignty with non-state actors, a country where 177 citizens, some of them children, were abducted over a week ago, while the president is tripping and falling on blue carpets in a foreign country.
So, Tinubu in Türkiye: Was it a stumble or a fall? My simple answer is: what does it matter?
