Amid playful jabs between Kenyan President Ruto and Nigerian President Tinubu, an economic reality check reminds us that humour can't mask the pressing challenges both nations face.

Listening to Kenyan President William Ruto diss Nigerians with a smile from faraway Italy, one would think he had taken a page from Amos Tutuola's The Palm-Wine Drinkard.

It was obvious that Ruto assumed Nigerians spoke that variety of unconventional English rendered by Tutuola in his story of magical realism from Yoruba mythology.

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Yes, Tutuola's English was neither the Oxford lexicon of Ngugi wa Thiong'o, nor, for that matter, the intense mastery of the Nobel-winning Wole Soyinka. It can be argued, however, that like Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Tutuola didn't set out to tell a story like Charles Dickens or George Orwell. But he did tell his story - unbounded, in the Nigerian spirit.

Ruto got some respite from the protests about the cost of living and difficult economic policies on the streets of Nairobi and felt comfortable enough to humour the Kenyan community abroad with a jab at Nigerian English. He later tried to walk it back, but the message had landed.

Who English epp?

While Ruto is browsing Nigerians for translations of English, enterprising Kenyan content creators are online baiting Nigerians for traffic. In fact, if the Kenyan high commissioner in Nigeria is within earshot,...