Prince Andrew’s unborn great-grandchild

Politics Spice Special Features Education Sex & Relationship Interview Columns Opinion Advertise with us Prince Andrew’s unborn great-grandchild Columns October 23, 2026 12:00 am Tunji Ajibade

Hello, as I write this, the latest news about your great-granddad is that a court of law has ruled a police raid on his residence illegal. Nonetheless, the police rationalise the illegal act and surprisingly say they wish to use the materials they seized as evidence in court. If this isn’t a scenario of “we must nail him by all means”, I don’t know what it is. Note that this is the first time a matter concerning allegations made against your great-granddad comes before their Lordships for determination, and he wins. This should give you an impression of the world in which your great -granddad happened. Everyone, including the police, appears to want to capitalise on his situation so badly that they engage in illegal acts or breach professional ethics. There’s this frenzy to convict him in the court of public opinion in a nation where citizens are presumed innocent until found guilty.

This piece is the other side to whatever you’ve read about your great-granddad. I know it’s a different world you meet, isn’t it? To me, it’s different only in the tools used. Humans, especially their emotional instincts, remain the same across the ages. In spite of whatever has transpired, for instance, your great-granddad’s mother loves him as mothers have always loved their children. Many people across the world like your great-granddad, too, one reason being that he has this naturally likable personality. In any case, the Yoruba people of Nigeria say, “one’s child can’t be so bad that one gives him to the leopard to kill”. I like and respect your great-granddad. Then news of mistakes in choosing friends came. Is it possible to suddenly dislike one’s child, or someone one feels close to, like one’s blood brother? I shall illustrate my point. Many years ago I travelled to a town, and on one of those days I embarked on my daily keep-fit walk. About two hundred metres ahead I noticed this large crowd in front of a prison facility. The crowd was such that it spilled onto the expressway and prison officials had to animatedly engage in some crowd control.

Despite such treatment from prison officials, the people, many of whom carried containers that one would suspect contained food, wouldn’t go away. I wondered why they were there. I later discovered it was visiting day. No matter the offence their sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, fathers or mothers had committed, these relatives and friends didn’t abandon them. That’s humans for you – emotional, compassionate. Humans don’t abandon those who’re really their own. That day, I took a different route, understanding that people needed to be forgiven for blocking the road for a few hours to show they cared about their own, even if the rest of the world distanced itself. I’ve never met your great-granddad, but if you get the point in my illustration, you’ll understand why some of us won’t dislike him just because allegations are made against him. Note that many who’re unforgiving towards your great-granddad do go to prisons to show care and sympathy for their convicted relatives and friends, waiting for them to come out and get a second chance.

Meanwhile, it may interest you to know that there are many who reason and talk like the then Archbishop of Canterbury once did, even if their voices don’t make it to the tabloids because it’s not popularly ‘correct’ to have them there. The archbishop said your great-granddad told him that he would like to make up for some incorrect choices he made in the past (“Archbishop Welby speaks for Prince Andrew and humanity”, ’Tunji Ajibade, The PUNCH, Aug. 22, 2022). The archbishop’s focus, I believe, is reconciliation and reconciliation is vertical as well as horizontal, something I pointed out in the quoted column. Many who realise that the archbishop’s job is essentially to reconcile understand and agree with him.

Back to your great-granddad’s mother who never abandoned him; you may think that’s only natural, and I agree. But it also indicated to me she didn’t think her son was the worst of humans, and I agree too. You see, many issues conspired against your great-granddad to pile up in those materials you’ve read. Among them, it’s the state of our world I call attention to. Most people make something out of another person’s situation, especially personalities like your great-granddad. Those in uniform aren’t left out. By admitting they consciously adopted illegal means to search his residence, as made clear in their official response to court ruling, the police have joined others in making stick on your great-granddad the “un-stickable”. Making stick the “un-stickable” is a main feature of your great-grandfather’s situation, as nothing he’s accused of has thus far been proven in a court of law. I presume if a court hadn’t declared their act illegal, some officers would have gotten away with the act of illegality, and their profiles would later proudly read in bold letters that they were part of the team that raided Andrew Mountbatten Windsor’s residence. Some profit from other people’s situation, and it’s one reason our world is so unforgiving.

As for talk of objective and balanced reporting, none of such applied in your great-granddad’s case. Every news report or opinion piece starts with the “disgraced” prince. There must be a clear negative qualifier because readers must know straightaway that reporters share their judgmental disposition, even though the profession requires them to report issues without value judgement. Everyone in the profession bows to something, including the audience, whose preferences must be reinforced. Note that your great-granddad isn’t the only victim of the world we live in, a world that believes a person is guilty by association. Yet those who believe this have kids and friends convicted for serious offences and they themselves aren’t guilty by association.

Here’s the backdrop to those materials you read about your great-granddad. After a certain US businessman died in jail before standing trial for his offences, everyone ever associated with him was asked to answer for what they knew and what they didn’t know. There were wild allegations made against those who had the briefest of encounters with the businessman. The US president, Donald Trump with the First Lady, has had to publicly respond to such wild allegations that are basically the imagination of some people’s mind. Another former US president, Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary, responded to questions too. This makes me ask: if the businessman didn’t die, would such a net have been cast to get his associates to answer in his stead? There’s is this sense of “grab whoever is alive and make them pay” to this hunt. Most prominent people dragged into this have since been left alone except your great-grandfather, and there’s a reason for it. His name, his status, as a senior member of the royal family sells news; even long after the news is dead, he can resurrect it. Such is how some reporters have any attention-grabbing news to submit to their editors, how some opinion piece writers get paid.

Your great-granddad admitted he made the mistake, like many other personalities stated, of being in contact with the said businessman and he apologised. As for allegations made by some, your great-granddad said it was long ago and he couldn’t recall details about those who made allegations. He apologised, had the matter settled out of court, and compensation paid, which was the responsible thing to do. The allegation that he shares secret information as the nation’s trade ambassador has yet to be proven in court. Worth noting, though, is that at the time he told the archbishop he wanted to mend his ways, many who would ask for forgiveness and expect to be forgiven for their own mistakes rebuffed him. That’s the world in which your great-granddad happened. Never think the worst of him; he’s a gentleman that many of us like, and we wish he never had contact with the businessman whose other ulterior motives were obviously not your great granddad’s.

Until the story of his contact with the businessman emerged, your great-granddad was dutiful, respectable, a great personality, and an asset to the royal family, which is why his mother stood by him. Now one wrong choice of friend he made is seized by everyone to summarise his entire life. Such shouldn’t happen. After you must have read some revelations about prominent news hunters who relentlessly rend his image, but who were later found to have something to hide themselves, I imagine you would judge your great-granddad more appropriately. Beyond this, I think reconciliation that’s vertical, which the archbishop inferred that your great-granddad equally sought, is important too in a world that’s become so decidedly unforgiving.

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