Change Begins With Me: Buhari Plagiarised Obama’s 2008 Victory Speech

Recall that on September 8, Buhari launched the ‘Change Begins with Me’ campaign project in Abuja as part of his government’s strategy to make Nigerians eschew “dishonesty, indolence, unbridled corruption and widespread impunity” and embrace daily introspection over their “immoral” conducts.

President Buhari had said, “We must resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship, pettiness and immaturity that have poisoned our country for so long.

“Let us summon a new spirit of responsibility, spirit of service, of patriotism and sacrifice, Let us all resolve to pitch in and work hard and look after, not only ourselves but one another.

“What the current problem has taught us is that we cannot have a thriving army of rent seekers and vested interests, while the majority suffers.”

The victory speech delivered by President Obama in 2008 similarly read, “Let’s resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long.

“So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of responsibility, where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves but each other.

“Let us remember that, if this financial crisis taught us anything, it’s that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers.”

Adeola Akinremi, a columnist with ThisDay, who was first to make the allegation, said that it was unethical of Buhari to plagiarise the US president’s speech, stating that “It is immoral to plagiarize other people’s work, but even worse to use dishonesty to launch a campaign about honesty.

“When you use another person’s work without acknowledgement, you have plagiarized. You simply pretend as if it is your own. It is unethical. It makes a mess of the campaign from the start. That is what Buhari has done, nobody will believe in the ‘change begins with me’ campaign, because it was built on lies,” Mr. Akinremi added.

Continuing, Akinremi said, “President Muhammadu Buhari made a terrible mistake last Thursday. He plagiarized President Barack Obama’s speech to launch ‘change begins with me’.

“So you didn’t notice that our president lifted from Obama’s 2008 victory speech and passed it off as if the words were his own?

“The argument will rage, but the moral problem of plagiarism on a day Mr. President launched a campaign to demand honesty and integrity from the people is what we should concern ourselves with.

“I’m not a wailing wailer and I don’t like the downfall of any man but I also don’t like to be deceived. The very last thing you should do when you’re launching a campaign like this is to be dishonest with the people.

“As Buhari talked down on Nigerians during the launch of the campaign spearheaded by no other person, other than the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Muhammed, known for his trash-talk, particularly for the opposition, I started following the speech line-by-line.

“I was alarmed to make the discovery. It was a scandal that escaped the attention of our newspapers. It is one of two things: either people don’t pay particular attention to Buhari’s words or we are a nation of anything goes.”