By Abdullahi A. Bakare Ph.D.
Kwara State University, Malete
The name “Iya Alakara” surfaced in late June 2026, when the First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, at a Renewed Hope Initiative (RHI) meeting with governors’ wives, suggested that women could cope with economic hardship by selling small items like Akara (fried bean cakes) and roasted corn. The remark went viral and sparked backlash. Critics, in an aggressive manner, called the remark as reducing ordinary people’s survival struggles to petty trading. While the name emerged from the public backlash, President Tinubu gave it official currency. On July 2, 2026, at the Press Corps Dinner, he introduced his wife as: “My dear wife, the First Lady, Iya Alakara”, drawing laughter from the audience.
However, on June 29, 2026, in Jigawa State, the First Lady pushed back and clarified her comments, saying the programme supports not just akara sellers but also tomato, booli (roasted plantain), pepper and vegetable traders. The Jigawa clarification on June 29, 2026, was not simply a correction but a strategic move with several layers of meaning. It was a reframing exercise designed to redirect the narrative while keeping identity with the policy. Instead of apologizing, retracting or retreating, the First Lady doubled down on the programme’s legitimacy. The phrase “we are not intimidated by all those wrong reports” portrayed the backlash as distortion and misinformation, rather than as a legitimate grievance. Her understanding of Iya Alakara mockery as a mere social media storm, and not a policy crisis positioned her as a leader who would not be swayed by social media pressure, while simultaneously demonstrating responsiveness by providing clarification.
By listing tomato, booli, pepper, and vegetable sellers, she shifted the conversation from a single, mockable image (akara) to the entire informal trading ecosystem. Critics had only attacked a narrow caricature, ignoring the narrative of a comprehensive programme, which the RHI genuinely serves. Ultimately, the June 29 response by the First Lady revealed a pragmatic, non-defensive instinct. It acknowledged the noise, corrected the record and determined to focus on delivery, signaled a disposition to keep moving by flagging off a ₦100 million recapitalisation grant for 2,000 petty traders in Jigawa.
President Tinubu’s decision to publicly call his wife “Iya Alakara” at the Presidential Press Corps Dinner on July 2, 2026, was likewise a deliberate political maneuver with several layers of meaning. It was a deliberate attempt at damage control, solidarity, and narrative reclamation. Calling her “Iya Alakara” in public, at such a high-profile event, was a declaration of open solidarity with his wife amid a storm of criticism. The joke was meant to acknowledge the social media storm, while simultaneously dismissing its seriousness. By laughing at the nickname, Tinubu effectively told the public: We hear you, we see you, but this will not define us.
Here is the twist: critics had turned the phrase into a mockery, but the President took ownership of the insult and disarmed the nickname, stripping it of its potency as a political weapon in the hands of political opponents. Hence, the nickname “Iya Alakara” moved from social media insult to Aso Rock punchline defusing its power to wound.
Beyond tactics, the moment also carried a quiet cultural message. The President embraced “Iya Alakara” as a term of respect and affection for a woman who trades in modesty. Tinubu implicitly dignified the very informal economy his wife had spoken about. A common reality across Yoruba land is that lawyers, doctors, and most today’s men of means were raised by mothers who fried akara. Ultimately, the narrative control was a pragmatic, non-defensive reflex. It acknowledged the noise, took the sting out of the mockery, signaled solidarity, and a disposition to keep moving.
The same instinct of keep moving is currently visible at Kwara State University, where the First Lady just commissioned an ICT Experience Centre on September 15, 2026. The facility, was funded through TETFund’s ₦6 billion across six geopolitical zones, with ₦1 billion per zone. The intervention is in partnership with the RHI, designed to accommodate over 500 students and train them in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, robotics, and software development skills applicable across professions. Other core facilities include free access to laptops, desktops and other digital resources for students from low-income families (possibly the sons and daughters of most Iya Alakara) who cannot afford personal devices.
KWASU (North central) is just one of the six tertiary institutions selected across Nigeria’s geopolitical zones for the pilot phase of the project. Other beneficiary institutions include Ekiti State University (South west), Federal Polytechnic, Oko (South east), Kaduna State University (North west), University of Cross River State (South south) and Taraba State University (North east).
More importantly, KWASU, like the other six beneficiary institutions, is not the final destination for the pilot phase of the project. The model is a prototype, intended for replication in tertiary institutions across the federation in the not-too-distant future, with TETFund’s Executive Secretary already setting a target of 271 institutions nationwide.
The KWASU ICT Experience Centre offers a striking different narrative angle. If “Iya Alakara” speaks to survival-level economics at the grassroots, the KWASU project targets the skills-driven future of young students. The First Lady’s recent visit to KWASU on September 15, 2026, is a turning point moment, bridging grassroots micro-entrepreneurship with institutional human capital development.
Arguably, true economic empowerment requires both informal micro-trading and formal higher education infrastructure working in tandem. Her call for low-capital, bottom-up enterprises (akara, kuli-kuli, petty trading) was interpreted as disparaging, yet symbolic of self-reliance. Her initiative at KWASU in collaboration with TETFund is a balancing intervention that uses infrastructure, technology, and research to scale up grassroots enterprise. The two set of interventions are not disconnected, both jointly form an empowerment chain, that extends from basic livelihoods to digital capacity.
Besides, this project is not an isolated event but part of a structured national pilot scheme led by the RHI in partnership with key federal agencies. This builds on earlier collaborations between the RHI and the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) for comparable community ICT centres.
An earliest flagship of the National Library project fits in as a high-profile expression of a broader pattern with a greater logic of scale and legacy. The First Lady used the RHI as a fundraising and partnership vehicle to intervene in a monumental project the State had long neglected. The National Library project, first conceived in 1981 and begun in 2006, was abandoned in 2008 and remained stalled for 18 years, having exhausted successive federal budgets while awaiting completion. Through the RHI, the First Lady raised over ₦20 billion from her 65th birthday donations toward its revival, surpassing the N8.9 billion originally proposed for its construction to completion.
If the ICT experience centre at KWASU is one of the six replicable pilots that would be cascaded across the tertiary system in Nigeria, the National Library is a decades-old national embarrassment turned resurrected national monument. Both projects serve as concrete evidence that her empowerment agenda extends beyond the Akara (bean-cake) anecdote. Whether disbursing ₦100 million to petty traders in Jigawa or raising over ₦20 billion for a library, the RHI functions as her delivery vehicle. While, the nickname ‘Iya Alakara’ captured a single viral moment, the institutional projects of monumental proportion by the First Lady, are a longer, quieter story that will outlast it.
To Senator Oluremi Tinubu, the critics had counted the jokes, let your enthusiasts keep counting the beneficiaries. Between the two camps, history will not remember the memes; it will remember the grants and much more, the buildings, and the graduates who walked through those doors with no laptop of their own and left with a skill that no one can take from them. Nigeria has never needed a First Lady to be popular, it has needed one to be persistent. You have chosen persistence; keep moving and let the job outlive the laughs.
© tobayan1@yahoo.com
