Reno Omokri: Communication or cunning craftiness?

By By Apostle Dr. Bolaji Akinyemi

I read with dismay the eulogy of Reno Omokri by Folorunso Fatai Adisa of Reno’s appearance as an honest bunch.

To elevate Reno Omokri as the gold standard of public communication is to mistake clever posturing for principled engagement. Yes, he speaks well, but clarity of tone is not the same as integrity of truth. One must not confuse volume with value, nor research with righteousness.

Reno is not a public intellectual; he is a partisan illusionist, repackaging half-truths with confidence, and coating propaganda in eloquence.

Let’s be clear: this is the same Reno who once launched fierce, personal, and relentless attacks on Bola Ahmed Tinubu, branding him as corrupt, unfit, and dictatorial—across books, columns, and social media.

Fast-forward to today, and he is rebranding the same man as Nigeria’s economic saviour. What changed? Not Tinubu’s record. Only Reno’s loyalty—hired, not inspired.

Reno no doubt is justifying his hires. The smartness here is not on the part of Reno, but Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu. If I were BAT, I would do the same! A Reno speaking on my side is better than against me.

His recent Lagos-Calabar coastal road controversy proves the point. Reno boasted of “debunking” critics by claiming the road project had advanced 30 kilometers—backed by a photo allegedly taken with Prof. Wole Soyinka.

But when TheCable and other independent journalists conducted a ground report, they exposed the bluff: the road had barely covered 25km of actual construction.

Reno later revised his claim to 19.5km, and asked that a drone should do the rest of the job in the company media he selected —no admission of error, no apology for misleading the public. That’s not communication; that’s calculated distortion.

Communication is not a battering ram. It is not shouting down podcast hosts or deploying statistics like smoke grenades to hide the truth.

Real communicators enlighten, not manipulate. Reno’s ability to command attention is not in doubt—but what he does with that attention is the problem. He doesn’t speak for the truth; he speaks for a paycheck. And that makes all the difference.

The true mark of a communicator is moral consistency, not rhetorical elegance. Until Reno accounts for his ideological somersaults and acknowledges his complicity in selling conflicting narratives for political gain, he remains not a communicator—but a craftsman of cunning words.