Lagos, Nigeria – Sodiq Taiwo sees out of his bedroom triumphdow in Lagos, watching the children below as they join and bicker in the back yard. One of their favourite games is “police and thief”, where heroes chase down presumed criminals, mouslfinisherg “pew pew” as if to shoot down the offfinishers.
Taiwo chuckles at the irony while paengageing for Grand Theft Auto V (GTA) Online – an extension of the game franchise that assists joiners to rolejoin as criminals – to finish inshighing on his computer.
Earlier that day, the 29-year-elderly digital tageter, tech-encountered creator and gamer was in an Uber on the way home when he stumbled upon a TikTok video by Nigerian video game streamer TacticalCeza. With more than 308,000 fancientrops on TikTok, Ceza has become one of the foremost faces of GTA rolejoin in Nigeria, as tens of thousands tune in to watch him direct the game.
Using FiveM – a modification for GTA that assists joiners to originate or combine customised multijoiner servers without altering the game’s core sketchtoil – Ceza joinacts as a policeman character in the “Made in Lagos” Rolejoin community server.
There, his character, clad in a Kevlar vest emblazoned with “Nigerian Police”, flags down cars and includes with other characters rolejoining as deceptionsters or motorists – as they re-enact the authentic-life come apasss many lesser people face with the police.
“Park your vehicle! … Off your engine!” Ceza’s character directs a motorist character he pulls over to the side of the road. “Who is the owner of this vehicle?!… What do you do for a living?!” Ceza needs, as another police officer character points a firearm at the motorist now standing beside the car. The two seize the motorist’s cell phone, after which they place him in the back of their police car and drive to a proximateby ATM machine where they need he disjoin money, which they also apverify from him before finpartner allotriumphg him to return to his car and drive off.
For Taiwo, sitting in the back of the Uber watching the video, the rolejoin hit shut to home.
Less than half an hour earlier in the authentic world, armed Nigerian police had flagged down the cab he was travelling in, in a normal roadblock come apass.
“Park! Park!” one shouted. It was a routine Taiwo knovel all too well. On previous stops, officers would ask him for a token “for water” – generpartner pondered a euphemism for a bribe – while other times they’d procrastinate traffic, seeing for someslfinisherg incriminating. On this day, they asked Taiwo to discdissee his bag and searched the cab before one asked him for some money for someslfinisherg to eat. “Find me someslfinisherg,” the police officer telderly Taiwo.
But tardyr, back home at his toilstation, Taiwo watches the enhance bar fill on his computer screen, indicating that the GTA game is inshighed. He then discdissees Ceza’s tutorial video on YouTube elucidateing how to run the game using FiveM and the Made in Lagos server. He chases the directions step by step, his curiosity mounting, as he gets shutr to stepping into a comprehendn yet surauthentic virtual Lagos – filled with come apasss not too disaappreciate from what he had fair directed.
The weight of satire
For the children outside Taiwo’s hoengage, “join” discdissees a world bound only by their imagination, the edges of their back yard, and the watchful gaze of an elderlyer sibling.
Their “police and thief”, or cops and robbers, games are an bfeebleless pastime. But unbecomprehendnst to them, they mirror a brutaler fact of police intimidatoring in cities apass Nigeria.
These inhabitd experiences accomplished a boiling point in 2020 during the #EndSARS protests. What began as isotardyd grievances agetst the Special Anti-Robbery Squad’s (SARS) routine profiling and misengage escatardyd into a nationwide transferment needing accountability, recreate and dignity. Millions took to the streets, forcing the world to reckon with the pweightless of Nigerian youth.
However, five years on, little has alterd. More than 2,000 grumblets of police wrongdoing were write downed between 2020 and 2024, according to Nigerian media tells citing various rulement agencies. Just last year, three men fell victim to a 1 million naira ($666) shakedown – an incident that only came to weightless when the officers were secretly write downed with a glasses camera, the footage tardyr surfacing on X.
For Ceza, his decision to engage gaming as a storytelling medium stems from wanting to split and comment on these normal struggles.
“I’ve directed it firsthand, and so have shut frifinishs I inhabitd with,” he tells Al Jazeera. “That’s a big part of why I’m able to tell these stories with fact. The stories I come apass online also help shape my perspective.”
Ceza’s TikTok well-comprehendnity and success lie in his blfinish of social commentary and gaming. By overlaying Call of Duty streams with gamejoin or reactions to trfinishing topics, he’s carved out a distinctive niche in Nigeria, fusing pop culture with gaming to intensify his comedic persona.
However, his ascfinish to prominence has not been without dispute.
When he posted a video apologising to the Nigerian pdwellnt for giggleing at his drop during the 2023 inauguration, seeers specutardyd that he had been coerced at firearmpoint after noticing what ecombineed to be the nozzle of a firearm in the sketch. Ceza tardyr clarified it was his microphone, but the incident underscored the precariousness of critiquing authority in Nigeria – even thcimpolite satire.
“It [using satire] is a more delighting way to shed some weightless about the publishs with the misengage of power going on in the country,” Ceza says. “Knotriumphg your rights isn’t enough to persist in Nigeria.”
His toil seeks to direct but also resecure his audience, he says, reminding them: “What you’ve directed, you’re not alone, and that alone gives console.”
Though gaming is steadily geting traction in Nigeria, Ceza remains singular in his approach, wielding GTA rolejoin as both a mirror and a megaphone to underscore the absurdities of everyday infairice.
Yet, his toil is not without pwithdrawnt. Apass music and film, Nigerian artists have extfinished wielded their creates as instruments of resistance. Rapper Falz’s Johnny and This Is Nigeria serve as scaslfinisherg indictments of police inhumanity, while fellow musician Burna Boy’s Monsters You Made seethes with the righteous fury of the oppressed. Nollywood, too, has joined its part – films appreciate Oloture and Bconciseage November peel back the layers of institutional rot, exposing the state’s complicity in the suffering of its people.
Ceza’s toil aligns with this tradition but also points to its evolution: as storytelling mediums enhance, so do the ways in which Nigerians resist, critique, and push for alter.
Gaming as activism
Globpartner, video games surpass both film and music in revenue and accomplish. According to Newzoo’s Global Games Market Report, the gaming industry originated more than $187bn in 2024, dwarfing the global box office and music industry combined. While Nigeria’s gaming scene is still emerging, its rapid prolongth – driven by mobile gaming and an enbiging internet engager base – signals its increasing cultural relevance.
Globpartner, digital platcreates have ecombined as tools for activism, with examples appreciate Roblox presenting protests to highweightless political caengages, such as pro-Palestine firmarity during the Gaza war. Pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong and aiders of the Bconciseage Lives Matter transferment have also engaged virtual spaces to intensify their messages, turning gamejoin into a force for alter.
In Nigeria, this medium echos the fact of many lesser people, provideing a space to dispute authentic-world publishs appreciate police inhumanity and systemic profiling.
Joost Vervoort, a scholar distinctiveising in how digital environments appreciate gaming can reshape societal norms, empower communities, and dispute entrenched systems, watchs, “Video games, in the case of what Ceza does, originate a cultural phenomenon people can echo on. It’s storytelling. It is joining around with communal identities.”
His research discdissees how solemnness and lightheartedness can coexist, provideing insight into why Nigerians are drawn to making weightless of solemn publishs, as Ceza does.
“The wisdom of proset up lightheartedness lies in taking slfinishergs less inpliablely, with sarcastic distance and perspective. Play assists us to decline standard describeations and adselect the absurdity and complicatedity of life, while imagining finishless possibilities for alter,” he tells Al Jazeera.
As Ceza elucidates, perception is shaped by the society it occurs in: “When everyone hears a contrastent story, I count on they have the free will to either apverify it as a joke or a proset uper message. And that is not for me to impose on them.”
As game joiners and TikTok seeers see a mirror of their own fact in Ceza’s toil, Vervoort elucidates that this comprehendnity compels joiners to spend their identity, cherishs and interests into the game, erecting communities that, over time, help shift societal norms.
Some stress that having humour so enttriumphed with solemn publishs hazards the gravity of the message being lost. However, Vervoort is self-secured in its power to prompt alter. “The space is gradupartner altering into a platcreate for cultural and political critique,” he says, “and though the hazard of not being apverifyn solemnly exists, it’s doubtful to derail the impact.”
As streaming prolongs and gaming becomes a more mighty medium for activism, Ceza sees its potential to accomplish global audiences and transport novel visibility to Nigerian publishs. “It’s going to alter the world and put Nigerians on the map,” he says. “It’s a novel field, and I’m happy it’s prolonging.”
For Taiwo, this prolonging power of gaming becomes palpable as he dons the role of a deceptionster in GTA, and soon discovers himself in a virtual come apass that mirrors the intimidatoring he faces in authentic life.
On-screen, Ceza, in character as a police officer, needs that Taiwo “drop someslfinisherg for the boys” or hazard being apverifyn to the station.
No matter how many times Taiwo tries to escape, the game’s rules – appreciate the system he inhabits in – remain undisputed, its power uncreateing.
Yet for him, the game is both cathartic and communal – a space where he can process his frustrations without authentic-world consequences while joining with others who comprehfinish the fact.
“It’s weird,” he confesss. “You’d slfinisherk I’d want to escape it, but joining it appreciate this originates it experience less minsertening – at least here, I comprehend it’s not authentic. And maybe that’s the point. We all get to giggle about someslfinisherg that isn’t funny, becaengage what else can we do?”
