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From the description of the VIP treatment given the two Binance executives abducted by the Nigerian government in a Mohammed bin Salman’s Ritz-Carlton style, one gets the impression that they did not think their tactic through. They detained the men (Nadeem Anjarwalla and Tigran Gambaryan) deemed economic sabotages, still allowed them several privileges, somehow forgot […]
Continue ReadingOne of the oft-repeated myths in this country is that when the poor are hungry enough, their final resort will be to eat the rich. But when one considers the Nigerian situation, one wonders just how much more hungry people need to get before they finally combust. Several revolutions in human history have been triggered […]
Continue ReadingAt a recent public event where he represented his principal, Chief of Staff to the president, Femi Gbajabiamila, used the opportunity to retrieve the hackneyed topic of social media regulations. While he noted the bid failed while he was the Speaker of the House of Representatives, he did not indicate that any new development had since […]
Continue ReadingAt a recent function in Abuja, Vice President Kashim Shettima expressed his disappointment that some Nigerians would rather be amused by the free fall of Naira value than pour ashes on their heads. According to him, “It is not only disheartening and disenchanting but also heartbreaking that yesterday when the Naira culminated to N1,500 to […]
Continue ReadingFor those of you who watched the BBC Africa documentary, Disciples: The Cult of TB Joshua (three episodes), an expose on the Synagogue Church of All Nations’ late founder Temitope Joshua and still insist on defending him, I have four words: you are not serious. Yes, the whole lot of you. Your faces are looking […]
Continue ReadingFollowing the attacks on some communities in Plateau State during the Christmas season, groups from the South to the Middle Belt regions of the country, have once again re-ignited the call to the government to let them bear arms. One cannot blame them. So far, the Plateau attack has culminated in about 190 deaths while […]
Continue ReadingThe revelation by the Ondo State Commissioner for Information, Bamidele Ademola-Olateju, that the presidential intervention in the state’s political crisis climaxed in demanding a signed resignation letter from the Deputy Governor, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, should have caused an outrage. There is no circumstance under which a deputy governor handing over his pre-signed resignation to the president […]
Continue ReadingThe argument that democracy is not working for Africa due to our historical and cultural factors is not new. Critics after critics have posited that Africans must evolve indigenous methods of democracy suitable for their temperament. The latest advocate to recuperate this old debate is ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo. At a forum last Monday, he shared […]
Continue ReadingThe various reports of the profligacy of some states in the country accentuate a crucial defect in our system of governance: the absence of autonomous entities that can hold leaders accountable. In several recent reports, the leadership of Lagos, Ogun, and Abia states was called out for the untenable expenses listed in their respective budgets. […]
Continue ReadingThe news report that about 15 airports that gulped no less than N301bn altogether failed to meet an annual threshold of passenger traffic exemplifies Nigeria’s white elephant peculiarity that I call “concrete democracy.” It is a phenomenon where the supposed dividends of democracy are expressed through concrete infrastructure or facility divorced from perceptible ideological agenda […]
Continue ReadingThe stories that dominated the news cycle in varying degrees the past week have something in common: they reported on the true nature of our politics as an infinite cycle of warfare among combatants who do not know alternative states of existence. They cannot figure out other ways to live, move, and have their being […]
Continue ReadingIt is said that the greatest trick the Devil ever pulled on humans was to make them doubt his existence. The quip, dating back to as far back as the 1836 book by John Wilkinson and memorably quoted in a 1995 Hollywood film, The Usual Suspects, is perhaps accurate only as far as Western society […]
Continue ReadingLast Friday, the Federal Capital Territory Commissioner of Police, Haruna Garba, while intimating newsmen about the epidemic of “stolen manhoods” in the nation’s capital and adjoining towns, noted that about 62 cases have been reported since September 21. Of this figure, Garuba said 51 were false. The “suspects” who raised the alarm have been charged […]
Continue ReadingWith the United States court mandating that Chicago State University release some of President Bola Tinubu’s records, Atiku Abubakar, the Peoples Democratic Party candidate and Tinubu’s rival in the last general elections, won a moral victory bigly. While this might not translate to legal gains in the upcoming Supreme Court, many Nigerians seem thrilled by the […]
Continue ReadingIf Nigeria were a different country, a society that draws a moral line no one is allowed to cross, the Minister of Women Affairs, Uju Kennedy-Ohaneye, would be out of her job by now. For some unclear reasons, she intervened in the case of the embattled Dean of Law, University of Calabar, Prof. Cyril Osim […]
Continue ReadingTwo developments that happened last week seemed disparate but were interconnected. First, it was the Bola Tinubu administration’s 100th day in office. That timeline used to be for an administration to glance back and celebrate its bold and decisive decisions that potentially set the country on track, but this one was rather muted. Several op-eds […]
Continue ReadingAnyone who has seen enough of Nigerian history and politics would have known beforehand how Wednesday would unfold. Despite all the build-up of anticipation in some quarters, the procedure of presidential electoral petition tribunals is standard: they deliver their judgment (expectedly in favour of the incumbent), analysts will dissect the verdict for days (maximum, a […]
Continue ReadingOne of the first things that jump at you in the charge sheet issued against Ilorin activist, Adegbola Abdulazeez (popularly called Tani Olohun), and published on SaharaReporters was the erroneous description of his religion as “idol worshipping.” It is a mischaracterisation borne out of socially transmitted ignorance. Public officers in other cultures are made to undertake diversity […]
Continue ReadingMany an unflattering adjective has been deployed to describe the vulgarisms of Senate President Godswill Akpabio. None of it matters. If you thought his predecessor, Ahmad Lawan, was too servile in his dealings with the executive, Akpabio leaves you with no doubt that he would be a lickspittle. In the video his aides made of […]
Continue ReadingIf there is an issue everyone—and I mean everyone—agrees on, it is that the cost of running the government needs urgent and radical pruning. One of the most topical issues in the public service system, administrative cost, is also where the government’s indecisiveness is highly exemplified. So it was no surprise when, on Monday, President […]
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