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Lagos, Nigeria – Sodiq Taiwo looks out the window of his bedroom in Lagos, watching the children below as they play and get in the backyard. One of their favorite games is “The Police and the Thief”, where the characters chase alleged criminals by stabbing “Pew Pew,” as if they were unlawful.
Taiwo has giggled the irony while waiting for Grand Theft Auto V (GTA) online – an extension of the game franchise, which allows players to benefit from colleagues as criminals – to finish to install on their computer.
Earlier that day, 29-year-old digital marketing, creator of technical content and gaming, was in Uber on the way home when he came across a Tiktok video of Nigerian video games of Tacticalceza video games. With more than 308,000 Tiktok followers, CEZA has become one of the most important faces of the GTA Roleplay in Nigeria, as tens of thousands are tuned to look at the game.
Using Fivem – a GTA modification that allows players to create or join a personalized multiplayer servers without changing the basic frame of the game – CEZA Playcts as the character of a police officer in the Made in Lagos Community.
There his character, dressed in Kevlar's waistcoat, decorated with the Nigerian Police, flags for cars and interacts with other characters who play as fraudsters or motorists, as they resume real life meets many young people who encounter the police S
“Park your car! … Out of your engine! “The Ceza hero instructs a motorist character who attracts the side of the road.” Who owns this vehicle?! … What do you feed? They drive to a nearby ATM, where they want to withdraw money, which they also take from it, before finally allow him to return to his car and drive.
For Taivo, sitting in the back of Uber, watching the video, the role game hit near the home.
Less than half an hour earlier in the real world, the armed Nigerian police had set a spice of the cabin in which it was traveling in a common obstacle meeting.
“Park! Park! “One called out. It was routinely he knew too well. At previous stops, officers would ask him for a “water” sign – generally considered euphemism for bribery – while they would slow down traffic another time looking for something incriminating. On this day, they asked Taivo to open his bag and searched the cabin before a person asked him for a little money for something to eat. “Find me something,” the policeman told Tyvo.
But later, back at home at his work station, Taivo watches how the progress bar fills on the screen of his computer, indicating that the GTA game is installed. He then opens the CEZA video on YouTube, explaining how to start the game using Fivem and Made in Lagos Server. He follows the step -by -step instructions, his curiosity grows as he approaches the step in a familiar but surreal virtual Lagos – filled with meetings that are not very different from what he has just survived.
Satire weight
For children outside the Taivo House, the “game” opens a world bound only with their imagination, the edges of their backyard and the careful look of a more adherent brother.
Their “police officers and thief” or cops and robbers games are innocent fun. But unknown to them, they reflect a more sulfur reality of police harassment in the cities in Nigeria.
These living experiences reached a boiling point in 2020. During #Endars protestsS What started as isolated complaints against routine profiling and abuse of special slave troops, escalating in a national movement requiring accountability, reform and dignity. Millions took to the streets, forcing the world to comply with the difficult position of the Nigerian youth.
However, five years onwards, a little has changed. More than 2000 complaints about police violation were recorded between 2020 and 2024, according to reports in the Nigerian media, referring to various government agencies. Last year alone, three men were victims of 1 million Naira ($ 666) Shakedown – an incident that came to light only when the officers were secretly recorded with a camera camera, with the footage later emerging on X.
For CEZA, his decision to use the game as an average story of stories stems from wanting to share and comment on these common struggles.
“I tested it first -hand, so I have close friends I lived with,” he tells Al Jazeera. “This is a big part of the reason I can tell these stories with authenticity. The stories I am on the Internet also help to shape my perspective. “
The popularity and success of Tiktok of Cesia is hidden in his mix of social comments and games. By overlapping Call of Duty with gameplay or trend reactions, he has carved a unique niche in Nigeria, plumming pop culture with games to enhance his comedic person.
However, his rise is not without dispute.
When he posted a video, apologizing to the Nigerian President for laughing at his fall during his entry into 2023, viewers speculate that he was forced to shoot after noticing what he seemed to be a gun nozzle in the frame. Subsequently, Cesa explained that this was his microphone, but the incident emphasized the uncertainty of the criticism of authority in Nigeria – even through satire.
“He (the use of satire) is a more cautious way to shed a little light for the problems of abuse of power that is happening in the country,” says Cesa. “Knowing your rights is not enough to survive in Nigeria.”
His work seeks to train, but also reassures his audience, he says, reminding them, “What you have experienced is not alone and it just gives comfort.”
Although the games are constantly gaining grip in Nigeria, SES remains the only one in its approach, having a GTA role -playing game as a mirror and megaphone to emphasize the absurdities of daily injustice.
Yet his work is not without precedent. In all music and films, Nigerian artists have long been in control of their crafts as tools for resistance. Johnny of the rapper Flaz and this is Nigeria who serve as a deplorable accusations of police brutality, while the monsters of Burn Boy's collaborator you have made Seethes with the righteous rage of the oppressed. Nollywood has also played its role – films such as Oloture and Black Novel detach the layers of institutional rot, exposing the complicity of the state in the suffering of its people.
The work of the CES is aligned with this tradition, but it also points to its evolution: with the development of the media to tell stories and the ways in which the Nigerians resist, criticize and insist on change.
Games as activism
Globally, video games exceed both the film and the music in revenue and range. According to a report on the Newzoo Global Games Market, the gaming industry generated more than $ 187 billion in 2024, combining the global box office and the music industry. While Nigeria's game scene is still appearing, its rapid growth – conditioned by mobile games and expanding internet user base – signals its increasing cultural significance.
Globally, digital platforms have become instruments of activism, with examples such as Roblox hosting protests to emphasize political causes, such as pro-Palestine solidarity during the Gaza War. Hong Kong's pro -democratic activists and the supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement have also used virtual spaces to enhance their messages, turning the gameplay into force to change.
In Nigeria, this environment reflects the reality of many young people, offering space to combat real problems such as police brutality and systemic profiling.
Joost Vervoort, a scientist specializing in how digital environments such as games can change public norms, empower communities and challenge fortified systems, observe: “Video games, in the case of what CEZA does, creates a cultural phenomenon on which people They can reflect. This is storytelling. It is played with municipal identities. “
His research reveals how seriousness and playfulness can exist together, offering an idea of why the Nigerians are attracted to make light of serious problems, as the CES does.
“The wisdom of deep playfulness lies in the acceptance of things less strict, with an ironic distance and perspective. The game allows us to reject normal interpretations and to perceive the absurdity and complexity of life, while imagining endless opportunities for change, “he told Al Jazeera.
As Cesa explains, perception is formed by the society in which it arises: “When everyone hears another story, I believe they have free will or accept it as a joke or a deeper message. And it's not for me to impose them. “
As the players of the game and viewers of Tiktok see a mirror of their own reality in the work of CEZA, Vervoort explains that this acquaintance forces players to invest their identity, values and interests in the game, building communities that over time help shift of public norms.
Some worry that humor is so intertwined with serious problems, it risks the severity of loss of the message. Vervoort, however, is confident in its power to encourage change. “Space is gradually becoming a platform for cultural and political criticism,” he says, “and although the risk of not being taken seriously exists, it is unlikely to derail the impact.”
As streaming grows and games become a powerful environment for activism, CEZA sees its potential to reach the global audience and bring new visibility to Nigerian problems. “This will change the world and put the Nigerians on the map,” he says. “This is a new field and I'm glad it is growing.”
For the time, this growing power of the games becomes tangible as it carries the role of a fraudster in the GTA and soon finds itself in a virtual meeting that reflects the harassment he encounters in real life.
On the screen, a session, in character as a police officer, requires a Tyevo to “let something on the boys” or to risk being taken to the station.
No matter how many times Taivo tries to escape, the rules of the game – like the system in which they live – remain indisputable, its power is not able.
Still, for him, the game is both a cathartic and a common space where he can process his disappointments without the effects of the real world while connecting with others who understand reality.
“It's weird,” he admits. “You would think I would like to escape it, but to play it so that it makes him feel less crazy – at least here, I know it's not real. And maybe that's the question. We all laugh about something that is not funny because what else can we do? “
