His is not just ordinary commentary. It is a political satire. A mirror held up to our country, its rulers, people and politics. His is the art of laughter and lament. Kevin Arua, who goes by the nom de guerre, Kevin Black, and the popular Governor Amuneke, an online voice that exposes folly, mocks power, and makes us laugh even when the truth hurts, has in a short time become the symbol of our country’s contemporary satire.
But, satire isn’t art for art’s sake. In its purest form, it is an act of rebellion. It unsettles authority. It questions the absurd. It mocks the powerful and shakes citizens out of apathy. From Aristophanes to Jonathan Swift, from George Orwell to Adeola Fayehun, the satirist has always been a moralist in disguise.
Governor Amuneke continues that tradition. He takes our country’s madness and turns it into an art form, showing us the dim wards of our national asylum, where we shuffle about as bedraggled inmates, muttering gibberish to ourselves and mistaking decay for destiny.
In that asylum, corruption wears the white coat of competence, and failure parades as reforms. We are patients and attendants at once trapped in a cycle of madness we no longer recognise as madness.
Governor Amuneke’s satire holds up the mirror to this condition. He shows us our deranged laughter, our absurd routines, our surrender to mediocrity dressed as governance. His art forces us to see that the asylum is not just political, it is moral, social, and psychological. It is the place where we have learned to live with delirium, where outrage has become therapy, and where laughter is the only medicine left to dull the pain of citizenship.
He makes us confront the terrifying normalcy of dysfunction. The roads filled with potholes and the endless excuses that make for the theatre of the insane. Yet, even in this theatre, he insists on laughter, not as escape; but as illumination. His genius is that he makes us laugh while showing us the tragedy of who we have become: a country clapping for its tormentors, applauding decay, and electing jesters to preside over ruins. His satire, in the end, is not a shield for inaction.
Political satire has always been a weapon of the powerless. In our virtual spaces, whether it is TikTok, Instagram, or X (formerly Twitter), it has become the people’s parliament. When institutions fail, when the legislature becomes a bazaar of self-interest, and when the judiciary is on its knees, satire takes over. It becomes the only safe way to speak truth to power. Governor Amuneke has mastered that. He uses humour to reveal our collective tragedy. He makes us laugh at the same people who make us cry. The world he creates is fictional; but the fiction is only a mask. Behind his parodies lies the sharp edge of truth. He caricatures politicians who speak of “renewed hope’ while presiding over despair. He mocks officials who celebrate failure as progress. He exaggerates reality to the point where it becomes impossible to ignore. That is the genius of satire; it hides its fury behind laughter.
Scholars have long recognised satire as a political act. Mikhail Bakhtin, the Russian theorist, saw it as a form of the “carnivalesque”, where the world is turned upside down and the lowly ridicule the mighty. In our country, where governance is often theatre, satire becomes the theatre within the theatre. Governor Amuneke performs in this second stage, using the tools of mockery, exaggeration, and irony to make our country visible in all its absurdity.
Regardless, it is important that we do not conflate satire with nihilism. Satire is never mockery for its own sake; it uses laughter as a mirror, not a weapon while exposing folly so that reform may begin. Governor Amuneke may joke, but the joke is not idle. Every punchline conceals a question: why are things the way they are? Why do we tolerate incompetence? Why do we