On 16 March 2025, The Republic’s editor-in-chief, Wale Lawal, joined a panel of intellectuals and analysts on The Toyin Falola Interviews to examine General Ibrahim Babangida’s memoir, A Journey in Service. The discussion assessed the book’s intent in relation to shaping public memory and recounting his years of military leadership.

In Lawal’s view, Babangida’s account was more focused on managing perception. ‘In many ways, history is the last frontier of justice,’ he noted. ‘The way Nigerians have felt about him will remain the same irrespective of what he has written. This book is not about correcting history; it is about controlling public memory.’

On the topic of how the memoir should be engaged with, Lawal assessed two sides of the coin. ‘Students of African history are often faced with the question of engaging archives along or against the grain. This book is a prime example where as much as we disagree with some content within the book, we must also be curious about why certain topics or issues are being raised by the author and what learning opportunities can arise from how this narrative has been crafted as well.’ An example of such topics for deeper inquiry is the book’s presentation of Abacha’s influence on annulling the elections. To sum up, Lawal expressed that the key importance of the book lies in its illustration of how power works and its interaction with public memory. The host, Professor Toyin Falola called this take a ‘brilliant thesis’.

Beyond Babangida’s account of historical events, Lawal expanded the discussion to a much broader concern: how progressive intellectual presence has faded in Nigeria and the urgent need to reignite it.