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The National Industrial Court of Nigeria (NICN) held its 2024/2025 Legal Year ceremony yesterday in Abuja. With a retired Justice of Supreme Court, Ejembi Eko as Chairman, I was the guest speaker. Below is a slightly abridged version of my presentation that speaks not only to labour justice and public interest but also the rule […]
Continue ReadingUsing the hashtag, #TheBudgetisaMess, BudgIT Nigeria made a crisp post Tuesday on X (formerly Twitter): “Just look at this, Nigerians! A Federal Polytechnic (NICTM) in Edo (State) has an allocation of N900 million to construct a road in Cross River (State). This same Polytechnic is renovating traditional palaces for N300 million and supplying motorcycles to Katsina and Bayelsa […]
Continue ReadingIn what must be an act of desperation, the Governor of Katsina State, Dikko Radda, last week promised to support communities that are ready to stand up against attacks by bandits, kidnappers and other criminals. “We have come up with an initiative that for any community ready to depend on itself, we will give them necessary support […]
Continue ReadingTo say that the administration of President Bola Tinubu is enmeshed in a crisis of credibility is to put the situation mildly. For a man who got to office with a statistically narrow mandate of 37 percent of total votes cast, many expected Tinubu to rise above himself in order to establish an enduring legacy. That expectation now appears misplaced. Even more worrisome is that despite being […]
Continue ReadingIn an interview with Financial Times published last Friday, Chairman of Heirs Holdings, Mr Tony Elumelu sounded more upbeat about the Nigerian oil and gas sector than he was two and a half years ago. As an industry player, Elumelu had lamented in March 2022 that the reason Nigeria could not meet its OPEC production quota “is not because […]
Continue ReadingIn October 2019, I was in Prague, Czech Republic, at the invitation of ‘Forum 2000’ to mark the 30th anniversary of the 1989 ‘Velvet Revolution’ which brought to power then Czechoslovakia’s famous playwright and political dissident, the late Vaclav Havel. ‘Forum 2000’ was founded in 1996 by Havel (who died in December 2011), in collaboration […]
Continue ReadingThe controversy began in April 2004 following the creation of 37 Local Government Areas (LGAs) by then Lagos State Governor, now President Bola Tinubu. Riled by what he considered to be an impudent act, then President Olusegun Obasanjo directed that funds for the LGAs in the state be withheld until Lagos reverted to the 20 […]
Continue ReadingNnamdi Kanu was apprehended in Kenya in June 2021 by security agencies and brought home to face trial. First arraigned on 14th October 2015 before eventually securing bail and fleeing the country, the proscribed Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) leader was slammed with an 11-count charge bordering on terrorism, treasonable felony, managing an unlawful society, publication of defamatory […]
Continue Reading(The 2024 edition of the Pastor Poju Oyemade-inspired ‘Platform Nigeria’ conversation held yesterday in Lagos with the theme, ‘Democracy and the Free Market Economy’. Speakers included Governor Chukwuma Soludo of Anambra State, Hon. Yakubu Dogara, a former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola, SAN, a former Lagos State Governor, Bishop Matthew […]
Continue ReadingThe National Minimum Wage Act that came into force on 18 April 2019 prescribed a five-year review cycle. For that reason, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) had the law on their side for the strike that paralysed the country on Monday. But even if some of us have issues with shutting down […]
Continue ReadingIn my 1994 book, ‘Fortress on Quicksand’, which chronicled the presidential primaries of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and National Republican Convention (NRC) and profiled the contenders during the aborted Third Republic of General Ibrahim Babangida, I wrote that it was glaring to the discerning that the experiment would not last. I had the same […]
Continue ReadingLast Sunday, for the fourth time in a row, Manchester City Football Club won the English premiership title. And because of that, ‘enemies of progress’ have not allowed some of us to rest. Even more annoying is that many of the noisemakers actually supported teams of little consequence in the title race. But in Nigeria, […]
Continue ReadingMr. Aderemi Adeoye retired yesterday as the Commissioner of Police (CP) in Anambra State. By his own admission, his net worth is now N20 billion! And he has set his eyes on displacing Alhaji Aliko Dangote as the richest man in Africa within the next ten years. I am also quoting him. “I have been […]
Continue ReadingLast Thursday, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar doubled down on his allegation that the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Road project is “a highway to fraud”. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate in the 2023 general election was countering claims by the Works Minister, Dave Umahi, whom he accused of dishonesty. “Umahi had announced that Hitech would […]
Continue ReadingStraight from Kuje Prison in Abuja, convicted gunrunner, Hamisu Bala (popularly known as ‘Wadume’) was received with a hero’s welcome to his hometown of Ibbi, Taraba State, on Sunday. He was reportedly driven round town in a long convoy of vehicles before visiting the palace of the traditional ruler, Alhaji Salihu Danbawuro. While many Nigerians […]
Continue ReadingMonday, the 2nd of April was marked globally as World Autism Awareness Day. Despite the millions of families who grapple with the challenge in our country, the day passed us by without much awareness. Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that about one in 88 Nigerian children is on the autism spectrum. That means we have more than two million autistic children […]
Continue ReadingSince the conclusion of my ‘missionary journey’ to Aso Rock almost 14 years ago, I have written more than a dozen columns on the need to reform the budgeting process in Nigeria. Notable ones include ‘The Illusion of Budget Performance’, ‘Budget War and Dysfunctional Envelope System’, ‘Buhari and the Budget Palaver’, ‘Nigeria’s 2016 Zero Budget!’ and ‘Of Government and Budget Blues’. The kernel […]
Continue ReadingI read a pathetic report last weekend of how the family of the late Second Republic Senate President, Joseph Wayas, was made to pay the sum of £6,710 (more than N13 million) before being allowed to sight his body in a London morgue. Wayas died on 30th November 2021, so I assumed he had been buried. Apparently, […]
Continue ReadingWith his supporters turning the Kirikiri (Lagos) Maximum Security Prison into a pilgrimage site, authorities of the Nigeria Correctional Service (NCoS) were forced to move the condemned Founder/General Overseer, Christian Praying Assembly (CPA) Church Worldwide, ‘Daddy G.O., His Holiness, The Most Honourable Dr Rev King’, to Kuje Prison in Abuja. Not long after, according to sources, the same […]
Continue ReadingOn Monday, military authorities in Guinea dissolved the interim government it had put in place since June 2022. They pledged to appoint a new administration. We recall that Colonel Mamady Doumbouya toppled President Alpha Conde in September 2021, in a coup hailed by many Guineans. Conde invited it upon himself by forcing through a controversial […]
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