In Nigerian politics, “[Voters] feel we are not worth it…that an albino person cannot deliver anything”

Image Description: A group of five people with faceless features, representing individuals with albinism in Nigeria.

As Nigeria’s 2023 general election drew close, with its attendant triplets of hype, hope and horror games, Abdullahi Ahmad, the African Democratic Congress candidate for the Zamfara State House of Assembly elections, felt positive about his chances of winning. He had done his homework to convince Maradun I state constituency’s eligible voters that he was the right man for the job. However, he would discover that most stakeholders of the voting process paid no heed to his capability and competence but only to the fact that he lives with albinism. 

Initially, Ahmad did not know what the fuss was all about during the campaign until his request for security support was met with indifference. “[The police] in turn, denied [my team] access to enter certain areas,” he remembers. Ahmad was left to fend for himself in a state plagued by insecurity. 

He alleges every facet of the electioneering process was used to frustrate and stigmatise him. “From securing our party’s ticket where my fellow aspirants had to say it to my face to mock me, to canvassing for votes, I heard whispers which later graduated to becoming loud noises that I should not win because I am with albinism.” 

The community he was dedicated to serving did not help matters. He recounts that a section of the potential voters who acknowledged his abilities  still believed a candidate without albinism would be a better choice.

While Ahmad shares the sentiment that one is likely to face discrimination whether or not one has special needs, what was most disturbing for him was how the people in his community “increased the shout that he’s an albino” immediately after he declared an interest in a state legislative seat. The ripple effect, as he narrates to Minority Africa, was that his psyche was significantly affected in the running to the polls, but he “did not allow the political shot to consume” him. 

“A dirty game”

It is a widely held view that politics in Nigeria is a “dirty” game. It entails fierce competition among numerous people jostling for administrative stools meant for a single winner with the majority of votes. To get these votes, political actors use every available means to grab power. 

Ahmad reveals to Minority Africa that albinism conspicuously presents a weak link for them to exploit during election season, a consistent strategy that has been used to decimate people like him interested in the political process.

Patience Samson Shallangwa, a politician living with albinism in Jalingo, Taraba State, adds that there is an ideology that people have about them that they are non-human compared to the “normal black people.” 

Shallangwa, as in the case of other sources, referred to “normal black people” as people without albinism. Throughout interviews for this piece, people with albinism used phrases like “black people,” “normal people” and “normal black people” to refer to those without albinism. 

“It is outrageous,” Shallangwa continues. “We are seen as people who are not fit to be seen in some particular positions. As a [person with albinism] and as a woman in Nigeria, very few people believe in us, and these few people cannot win us tangible votes. They feel we are not worth it. It is a thought process in them that an albino person cannot deliver anything. I have been there and I have felt the heat of taking on leadership roles among black people.”  

Between May and June 2023, two politicians with albinism, one from Kebbi State and another from Ondo, cancelled interviews with Minority Africa. Their reason? Nigeria doesn’t care about their struggles, and they are still recovering from the ridicule they endured. 

More depressingly, Johnson Adediwura, a National Assembly aspirant in Osun State, concludes that “the political environment in Nigeria is meant to consume people with albinism and prevents them from speaking up.” Drawing from his personal experience, he believes that when people with albinism complain about mistreatment, their struggles and discrimination, people are quick to conclude that they are making excuses for their inability to build sustainable electoral bridges capable of winning elections. 

“I wanted to go to the National Assembly in 2019 under a less-crowded party, [an official] in my party asked me if I had ever watched or seen any legislative plenary which I nodded in affirmation,” Adediwura says. “He then asked me pointedly if I had also seen an albino among the representatives. My heart melted with despair and guilt as I stepped down.”

According to a 2022 Voice of America (VOA) report, only about 4 million people live with albinism in Nigeria which is less than 1% of the entire population. However, Adediwura believes a genetic condition that decreases the production of melanin in his body and results in pale skin, light eyes and hair, and increased susceptibility to skin and eye diseases should not define his political viability.  He is convinced that his party Mega Party of Nigeria (MPN), which the country’s electoral umpire has now delisted, denied him the ticket because of the colour of his skin. 

The same goes for Ahmad, who credits his loss at the election in Zamfara partly to albinism and alleges he would have won otherwise. “I was the runner-up at the polls. I should have won if I was not discriminated against. I had the best campaign.” 

The collective disappointment of the two politicians matched each other despite living in contrasting regions in the country and running for different political positions, coming from different parties and election cycles. It mirrors the stark reality others deal with. Some of them, such as Adediwura, are broken by the harsh political environment and they vacate the political scene while others continue to push on, like Ahmad who is already making consultations for a gubernatorial run in 2027.

“The more they discriminated against me, the more I jerked myself up”

Dr. Adeleke Adedokun has spent his career navigating the worlds of environmental policy and politics while living with albinism. The risks were clear from the start. Long hours of fieldwork under the sun made his work in environmental advocacy physically demanding, but he never let that stop him.

He was already a director at the Federal Ministry of Environment in 1999, the year it was created. In 2007, his political career took a major leap when he was appointed Ogun State’s Commissioner for Environment. There, he led the establishment of the state’s first Environmental Protection Agency, a milestone that reshaped how Ogun tackled environmental issues.

“As I speak to you now, I led the All Progressives Congress Campaign in the whole Ogun East Senatorial District in the last election. If I say I have not been discriminated against, that will be the cheapest joke of all time.” Adedokun says. “I have spent more than thirty years in my field and politics and I understand that everyone will want to take someone who they think is okay for a position based on their judgement. Based on this judgement in the political space, if you are with albinism you might fall short.” 

He says he has triumphed in the Nigerian political arena because he places himself well enough and does not believe he is different from other politicians “healthwise.” Since joining politics, he has circumvented the stigmatisation by leading every tough political and intellectual battle in Ogun state.

“It is easy to notice me in all rallies and political campaigns because of my skin colour. I don’t take the back seat. The more they discriminated against me, the more I jerked myself up,” Adedokun states firmly.

Nonetheless, this experience is not uniform for all politicians living with albinism. One of those is Abiola Jagunmolu, a notable politician since 2003. He traversed and marshalled student-cum-institutional politics before becoming a politician of repute in Oyo Central Senatorial District of Oyo State. He’s a Special Adviser to the senator representing the district at the country’s upper legislative chamber. 

In his twenty years of political and grassroots mobilisation experience, Jagunmolu reveals to Minority Africa that because politics and electoral positions are talk businesses, people have said a lot about him to weigh him down because he has albinism. 

“Politics is a race among the best talkers who can convince people to believe in them. So for me, people have said a lot to kill my spirit mostly in my absence because they want people to believe in them,” he says. “When they discover that I don’t back down, they end up spreading false narratives that I am arrogant.” 

For Ahmad, the biggest betrayal wasn’t from “normal black people” but from others with disabilities. “They said if I win, people will start to use me as a case study for them to follow and I will become a superhero. My closest challenger started using their stand against me in his campaign that even my people don’t like and want me.”

Shalangwa agrees. “For me, it is not only with people with other disabilities, I have experienced this even among PWAs themselves. Most of us lack a cooperative spirit. I have come to realise that this happens because a lot of them hate themselves for being who they are and will attempt to bring anybody who is trying to live and excel with their personal realities down.”

Jagunmolu does not totally agree with this, but asserts that there could be a possibility because politics is a marketing business and an antipathy towards a person with albinism by other PWDs and PWAs can be stage-arranged by opponents to demarket a person with albinism. 

Adedokun, however, refuses to comment. “I’ve never experienced that,” he says simply. 

A hollow victory?

Jake Epele, founder and CEO of TAF Africa, an organization advocating for the political inclusion of people with albinism and disabilities in Nigeria, saw the 2023 election cycle as a turning point. For the first time, he believed the country had elected a governor with albinism—a milestone he had long hoped for.

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That governor was Pastor Umo Eno of Akwa Ibom State. Eno, however, does not publicly identify as a person with albinism. Still, for Epele and others in the community, his victory carried symbolic weight. It felt like a breakthrough, a sign that politicians with albinism could finally claim a seat at the table.

With great satisfaction, he tells Minority Africa that “the new governor is the only person with whichever disability that got elected in the just concluded 2023 election cycle.”

Eno’s announcement to run for governor sparked mixed reactions in 2022 with some members of the public declaring he was unfit because he was an “albino.” His wife quickly rose to his defense. In a viral video clip reported by local media, she was quoted as saying, “My husband is very special and unique; they call him albino, but I say he’s my golden boy.” 

Epele and his organisation are not the only ones taking positives from Pastor Umo Eno’s electoral victory. Timothy Ojo-Ibunkun, another person with albinism and the facilitator of Tim Talk, an initiative aimed at improving the political disposition of young people in Nigeria, based in Ile Ife Osun State, is joyful to see someone like him taking the mantle of leadership as an elected governor in a political environment unfriendly to politicians with albinism. 

As he nurtures his long-term political ambition for the Osun State gubernatorial race, such an enviable feat as Eno’s electoral victory is inspirational. “I can’t hide that such glad tiding is crucial to developing a very thick skin in the political world. It is certainly a much-needed boost,” Ojo-Ibunkun says. 

Nonetheless, Eno does not identify with the albinism community and when the governor was contacted, he directed Minority Africa to his Chief Press Secretary who noted that they do not “discuss issues like this.”

In another interview with TAF, Jake Epele said through his assistant, George Dominic, that the organisation does not know of any politicians with albinism who have held political offices that associate with the albinism community. 

“Whether we like it or not, they have the right and freedom to associate with whatever group they wish,” Dominic says. “We don’t force anyone. We might not know why they are doing so but what we know is that some politicians with other disabilities always prefer not to fill in that they have disabilities with INEC when contesting elections for reasons best known to them.”

The political successes of Nigerians with albinism are few and far between but for many in the community, the trend of a few successful politicians with albinism not identifying with them leaves more to be desired.

Bolaji Iteoluwa, founder of Albino Rocks, an organization dedicated to raising awareness and supporting people with albinism, sees this as dangerous. When politicians with albinism refuse to acknowledge their shared struggles, he says, they risk making things even harder for themselves. 

“People are seeing that successful politicians with albinism are not amplifying their voices to correct the stigma. They are not entertaining conversations around the problems or lending their voices to support them,” Iteoluwa tells Minority Africa. He adds that the refusal of some politicians with albinism to create awareness about the struggles of people with albinism in Nigeria will make the political space harder to infiltrate. 

Oluwaseyi Cole, chairman of the Albino Association of Nigeria’s Lagos Chapter, shares that concern. For politicians with albinism, the battle is already steep, but the greatest obstacle, she argues, comes from within.

“It is dangerous and destructive that when everybody, including families, leaves us alone, those we call our own, who face the same predicament as we do, are disowning us too,” she says.

Editors Note: Interviews for this story were conducted between 2023 and 2024. 

Edited/Reviewed by PK Cross, Caleb Okereke, Adebola Makinde, Samuel Banjoko, Awom Kenneth, Uzoma Ihejirika. 

Illustrated by Rex Opara.