The rise of data boys, by Stephanie Shaakaa

In today’s Nigeria, truth is no longer the currency of politics, propaganda is. Not data in its pure, factual form, but twisted, doctored, weaponized data.

In Nigeria today, hunger walks the streets, insecurity spreads like wildfire, and yet the loudest sound you hear is not truth but propaganda.

The nation has entered the era of the data boys,political aides whose work is not governance but deception. They are the digital mercenaries of our democracy, flooding social media with noise disguised as knowledge, spin presented as statistics, and slogans masquerading as solutions.

These men and women are not blind. They see the hunger that stalks the streets, the insecurity that consumes entire communities, the collapsing institutions that can no longer protect citizens. Yet they log in daily, armed with empty graphs and loud hashtags, determined to persuade Nigerians that darkness is light. They dress failure in the clothes of progress. They rename poverty as sacrifice. They re-brand chaos as reform. For a monthly stipend, truth is discarded and survival becomes strategy.

The tragedy is not only in the lies they tell but in what their lies cost the nation. Every sponsored post erodes public trust. Every doctored statistic deepens cynicism. Every tweet of denial further buries accountability. And in the end, it is ordinary Nigerians who pay the price. The farmer who cannot access his land because terrorists have seized his village is told that insecurity is under control. The graduate who cannot find work is bombarded with glossy infographics about youth empowerment schemes that exist only on PowerPoint slides. The mother struggling with doubled food prices is told inflation has fallen. Spin does not put food on the table. Lies do not make roads safe. Propaganda does not heal wounds.

Nigeria has always had its sycophants. From the court jesters of monarchs to the praise-singers of military rulers; from the rented crowds at rallies to the loyal party men who defended dictators. The disease is old. But today’s data boys are different. Their arena is not the palace courtyard but the digital space. Their drums are not traditional but algorithmic. Their stage is not the village square but Twitter and Facebook. They are the modern extension of an ancient sickness, flatterers who serve not truth, not the people, but their pockets.

Most are driven not by patriotism but by the need to stay relevant or keep their stomachs full. For some, loyalty has been monetized, for others, fear of obscurity is the fuel. Integrity becomes too costly to maintain. The country bleeds while they tweet away. They thrive on our collective pain, not because they believe in their principals, but because they must justify the alerts they receive at the end of the month. And they do so shamelessly, even when they know that the very policies they defend are driving millions deeper into despair.

Elsewhere, aides caught lying are disgraced and dismissed. In Nigeria, they are rewarded with promotions for perfecting the art of falsehood. It is a grotesque reversal of values, a culture where deception is not punished but prized. But history does not forget. Praise-singers have never survived the collapse of the thrones they defended. When their masters fell, they were left broken, irrelevant, and forgotten. The dictators they hailed moved on, but they remained behind as relics of dishonor. The same fate awaits today’s data boys. Their names may never enter history books, but their fingerprints will remain on the lies that prolonged our suffering.

The danger is not abstract. It is real, tangible, and destructive. When propaganda takes root, governance rots. When governance rots, institutions decay. And when institutions decay, the people are left defenseless. The cost of propaganda is not merely noise on social media. It is the deepening of insecurity, the worsening of poverty, the slow strangulation of hope.

The real question is not whether propaganda will fail. It always does. Lies may buy time, but they cannot buy salvation. Reality is stubborn. No amount of Photoshop or hashtags can erase the hunger in the streets, the joblessness of the youth, or the fear in villages under siege. Eventually, truth catches up. And when it does, the reckoning will not be kind.

Nigerians must decide how long they will allow themselves to be fooled. How long will the nation tolerate doctored statistics when the evidence of collapse is everywhere? How long will citizens let digital theatrics substitute for accountability? The people must learn to see beyond the sweet-coated numbers, the loud cheerleaders, the infographics dressed as progress. A country cannot be built on propaganda. Integrity is not optional. Truth is not employment. Governance is not about defending politicians but defending citizens.

Data boys may dominate our feeds today. Their noise may drown out integrity for a while. But no nation can outshout reality. No politician can bribe truth forever. When accountability is finally demanded, when citizens refuse to be silenced by hashtags, the voices of deception will vanish into irrelevance.

History will write its verdict. Not of brave patriots, not of honest aides, but of accomplices who sold their voices for stipends and betrayed their country for rent. The question is not whether they will fall, they will. The real test is whether Nigerians will have the courage to stop applauding lies and start demanding truth.

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