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Film hits cinemas nationwide tomorrow
By Beifoh Osewele
President Bola Tinubu will today make his first major public appearance since returning from a four-week stay in Europe when he hosts the national premiere of MKO, a documentary on the June 12, 1993 presidential election and the struggle that followed its annulment.
The Independence Day premiere at the Wole Soyinka National Theatre, Iganmu, Lagos, carries a symbolism that goes beyond cinema: Tinubu and the late Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola once belonged to the same Social Democratic Party (SDP), while the President later became part of the pro-democracy movement that fought for the recognition of Abiola’s electoral mandate.
For Tinubu, the event also marks a return to the public stage after weeks of controversy over his prolonged stay abroad.
The premiere is being held under the auspices of the Presidency in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Art, Culture, Tourism and the Creative Economy.
Guests are to be seated by 3 p.m., while the gates will close at 4 p.m. ahead of the President’s arrival. A reception will follow the screening.
Tinubu left Nigeria on August 30 for what the Presidency initially announced as a three-week working vacation in Europe, spending time in London and Paris before returning to Lagos on September 29 after about four weeks away.
His extended stay, particularly his absence from the 81st United Nations General Assembly in New York, where Vice President Kashim Shettima represented Nigeria, drew criticism from opposition figures and triggered questions about his continued absence from the country.
The Presidency rejected suggestions that anything was amiss, maintaining that Tinubu remained healthy and continued to discharge his responsibilities while abroad. His return through Lagos was also linked by the Presidency to today’s programme honouring Abiola.
That makes the premiere a convergence of history and contemporary politics.
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Abiola contested the June 12, 1993 presidential election on the platform of the SDP, running a campaign built around “Hope ’93” and the promise of “Farewell to Poverty.” The election was annulled by the military government, plunging the country into a prolonged political crisis and eventually making Abiola one of the enduring symbols of Nigeria’s democratic struggle.
Tinubu was himself an SDP politician and was elected senator for Lagos West in 1992. After the annulment of the June 12 election and the return of full military rule, he became involved with the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO), which campaigned against military rule and for recognition of Abiola as the winner of the election.
More than three decades later, Tinubu is President under an administration whose governing programme is branded the Renewed Hope Agenda.
Thus, from Abiola’s Hope ’93 and Farewell to Poverty to Tinubu’s Renewed Hope, today’s premiere brings together two political eras linked by the same democratic history.
MKO, directed by Nigerian-American filmmaker Ose Oyamendan, revisits the June 12 election, its annulment, Abiola’s subsequent detention and the pro-democracy agitation that followed.
The documentary features archival materials and accounts from major figures connected with the period, including former military leaders Ibrahim Babangida and Abdulsalami Abubakar, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka and Tinubu himself.
The film had its international premiere at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival in the United Kingdom in June and will move from today’s presidential premiere to cinemas nationwide tomorrow, October 2. It is being distributed by Nile Entertainment.
Nile Entertainment Managing Director, Moses Babatope, said the nationwide rollout was intended to give Nigerians broad access to the story, describing it as an important film about the country’s history.
The timing is deliberate. Thirty-three years after Abiola campaigned across Nigeria on the promise of Hope ’93, a former SDP senator who became part of the struggle over the annulled mandate will sit as President at the premiere of a film documenting that turbulent chapter.
And as the lights go down at the Wole Soyinka National Theatre today, the story of June 12 will move from political memory and history books to the big screen — from Hope ’93 to Renewed Hope.
